Instant takeaways from the BU men's basketball team's 60-54 home victory over American
Mike McNair (20 points), Kyrone Alexander (15 points) and Miles Brewster (9 points) led the way.
After the Boston University men’s basketball team closed the first half on Wednesday night with a 9-0 run to tie its home contest with American at 30, Joe Jones stepped to the microphone for a sideline interview with the ESPN+ broadcast.
“I thought we were fortunate,” he said.
The Eagles (7-9, 1-2 Patriot League) ran circles around BU’s defense at times but missed open shots, and at the other end, hounded the Terriers’ perimeter players and guarded ball screens aggressively.
Ultimately, Jones concluded: “They dictated too much.”
So BU, in one of the biggest games of its season thus far, came out in the second half and started dictating themselves. The Terriers’ guards attacked the basket and crashed the glass offensively, the team as a whole followed AU’s actions defensively, and pretty soon, BU led by double digits.
The Terriers (8-8, 2-1 PL) hung on for a 60-54 victory from there, over the team picked to finish one spot ahead of 3rd-placed BU in the conference preseason poll.
“We feel good,” assistant coach Al Paul said on the sidelines postgame. “This was a good game to build going into Colgate (the four-time defending Patriot League champion, which BU plays on the road on Saturday.”
Here are four takeaways from the victory:
BU finally won consecutive games again, and at the perfect time.
Coming in, BU hadn’t won two games in a row in over a month. The Terriers had shown flashes of elite potential all year, but had so far followed those flashes with frustrating losses. That was the story to begin Patriot League play six days ago at Lafayette.
But two games later, BU’s finally started a win streak again. The Terriers won a dogfight with a ruthless second half on Sunday against Army and did the same at home on Wednesday. BU made timely plays throughout the final 20 minutes, outrebounded the Eagles, 35-29, overall and finished with 28 points in the paint to AU’s 18.
Sophomore Kyrone Alexander (15 points), per usual, was excellent. Graduate Miles Brewster pushed pace in transition — something BU’s been doing more of lately — and looked good doing it. The Terriers, in the end, made the critical plays against a quality league opponent and finally displayed the consistency they’ll need during the rest of the conference schedule.
But the player who had the most to do with it…
Mike McNair was lights out — per usual.
The Patriot League’s fourth-best 3-point shooter by percentage (44.6) did what he does once again on Wednesday — dropping a season-high 20 points on 6-of-11 shooting with 4 triples.
He’s now averaging 10.8 points per game after scoring just 58 total as a freshman last year. He’s as cold-blooded and reliable as it gets from downtown, and his shot-making (plus his effort, he had several offensive rebounds, a steal and a block Wednesday) has kept BU in games this season. He’s started every contest after starting none in 2023-24.
McNair is one of BU’s best players, point-blank-period, and is quickly becoming one of the better players in the entire conference.
Nico Nobili started for the first time in over a month.
Jones had gone with a starting lineup of Brewster, McNair, Alexander, junior Otto Landrum and senior Malcolm Chimezie the previous four games, but swapped out Landrum for fellow junior Nobili on Wednesday.
Nobili didn’t score or record an assist in the win over Army, but Jones was thoroughly impressed with his performance postgame. “He allowed us to play good basketball when he was in,” Jones said then.
Nobili’s start was notable, especially after Jones had stressed the importance of finding the right lineups after the win over Army, saying he was now “pretty confident the way I’m going to go with this thing.” Nobili finished with 4 assists and 6 rebounds.
Nobili (6-foot-10), an excellent passer and ball-handler as a forward, spends most of his time on the perimeter, dragging bigger defenders out with him and creating space for BU’s guards to drive off the dribble.
Miles Brewster played with confidence.
It’s difficult to overstate the importance of Brewster, who Jones hails as one of the best leaders he’s ever had. But the graduate guard was also a preseason All-Patriot League selection, and when he’s aggressive and confident, he’s one of BU’s best offensive players.
Brewster had 7 points in the first half and didn’t miss a shot. Throughout the game, he was eager in transition and pulled the trigger on 3-pointers without wasting time, finishing with 9 points and 6 rebounds.
After scoring just 5 combined points on 2-of-12 shooting in the non-conference finale and conference opener, Brewster has 21 total in the last two games. BU couldn’t have won either without him, which is normally the case. Brewster was inconsistent last season before surging late (BU, unsurprisingly, surged with him); after an up-and-down start to his final year, BU is certainly hoping he’s heating up during conference play again.