The pieces are starting to fall into place for BU men’s basketball
A series of injuries has prevented BU from soaring. However, after Wednesday's statement win over American, it feels like the Terriers have arrived.
Before the Boston University men’s basketball team could make its statement on Wednesday night, the Terriers first had to figure out who they actually were.
The answer there has turned out to be far more complicated than anyone originally anticipated. The young team that grew up at the perfect time last season was ravaged by injuries in the summer. Their preseason practices suffered because of it, and eventually, their regular-season sessions did too. Guys finally returned only for others to go down. Almost every big win has been followed with a loss, because frankly, this hasn’t been the same team that ended a year ago with so much momentum, no matter how perfect that would’ve been.
It took 16 games and plenty of soul-searching, but now, after BU’s 60-54 victory over American (7-9, 1-2 Patriot League) on Wednesday night, it truly feels — for real this time — like these Terriers have arrived.
BU (8-8, 2-1 PL) is healthy, at least as healthy as it’s been since before the summer. The Terriers are starting to find lineups that work. They’re getting improved play from one critical player and continued excellence from two others. They’re winning Patriot League games and, crucially, they’re now doing it all multiple nights in a row.
“I feel like we’re in the fifth game of the season,” head coach Joe Jones said postgame.
That, after all, is the eternal beauty of the Patriot League. Even though BU lost Ethan Okwuosa and Matai Baptiste to injury in-season, had to send out a hobbled Nico Nobili and had to wait for Otto Landrum to return — all of those guys are potential starters — BU still had 13 non-conference games of slack to use on figuring itself out. The games that actually matter are here now, and after a flat start to Patriot League play six days ago at Lafayette, BU has now won consecutive games for just the second time this season. These last two games were dogfights, too, contests in which the Terriers needed to make consistent adjustments and come up with timely plays in big moments.
In other words, BU needed to be a well-oiled machine to win these two battles, and for the first time this season, it was.
It didn’t look that way early, as American ran circles around BU with its screen-heavy actions and bothered the Terriers at the other end with aggressive perimeter defense — which has been a problem for BU all year. A displeased Jones would eventually tell the ESPN+ broadcast at halftime that AU was “dictating too much,” but critically, not before the Terriers rattled off a ruthless 9-0 run in the final minutes to somehow knot the game at 30 heading into the break.
Mike McNair drained an in-your-face wing 3-pointer, then fellow sophomore guard Kyrone Alexander drew an offensive foul on PL preseason Player of the Year Matt Rogers. Jones used a use-it-or-lose-it timeout with less than a minute to go, and McNair canned a wide-open triple out of it. BU got another quick stop and eventually, off an inbounds with 2 seconds on the clock, Alexander nailed a sidestep 3 at the buzzer.
Boom. 30-30. Just like that, after getting outplayed for most of the half.
It was so good that Jones, with more time to reflect, said postgame he was actually “pretty excited going into the second half,” despite being notably upset immediately before going into the locker room.
“We hung in there in the first half, man,” he said, beaming. “We just kept coming back.”
In a sharply focused halftime debrief — “A lot of Xs and Os, it wasn’t a lot broadly said that would translate [to the media],” graduate guard Miles Brewster said — the Terriers talked about dealing with AU’s defensive pressure and worked out what the Eagles’ offense was even doing to them. The result? By the under-12 timeout, BU suddenly led by eight, after AU had missed 12 of its first 14 second-half field goals. Between the end of the first half and the first 10 minutes of the second, the Terriers went on a 25-7 run.
Jones started the half with the same lineup he sent out for the opening tip — Brewster, McNair, Alexander, junior forward Nobili and senior center Malcolm Chimezie — one that saw Nobili replace junior forward Otto Landrum. Landrum had started the prior four games, but Jones stressed the importance of finding the right lineups following the win over Army on Sunday, saying he “was now pretty confident the way I’m going to take this thing,” and Nobili got the nod.
Nobili, who’s been in and out of the rotation with a shoulder injury, finally looks healthy and finished with six rebounds and four assists on Wednesday. BU was +5 with him on the floor.
“He finds guys,” McNair said. “And he’s a really unselfish player.”
“Nico is more of a forward than Otto,” said Jones. “Otto and Malcolm are not the same, but they’re similar, and trying to play those two guys together, there’s just not a ton of space. So we’ve had to kind of manipulate our lineups to balance them out.”
Another lineup change Jones has made recently has been less scientific, but just as effective. That’s playing junior guard Ben Roy more, especially with the starters and especially late in games.
Why?
“He’s a dog,” McNair said.
Brewster added “he’s a really active ball player,” and Jones declared simply: “He knows what we’re doing.” At 6-foot, Roy is one of the smartest players on every floor he steps on, routinely making critical defensive plays despite his size. He played the last eight and a half minutes on Sunday (28 total) and was on the floor for the final 14 on Wednesday.
He was one of the reasons, even though American cut what was an 11-point lead to two possessions with under three minutes to go, BU pulled through. Another was the renewed aggressiveness of Brewster (nine points, six rebounds), a preseason All-Patriot League selection. BU needs him dearly, and after scoring just two points in the league opener at Lafayette, he’s got 21 combined over the last two games.
Having McNair and Alexander on the floor certainly helped too — McNair (season-high 20 points, four 3-pointers) recorded both a critical block and a steal while corralling several offensive rebounds, while Alexander (15 points), came up with an outrageous rejection on Rogers to snuff AU’s late run. BU’s two leading scorers have been the only constants so far this year.
“Obviously, Mike was sensational. Ky played really well offensively as well,” Jones said, with the tone of a man who's gotten very used to saying that.
At long last, the picture is starting to get clearer around those two. BU, picked to finish third in the PL preseason poll based on the assumption that its group from last year would be back and healthy, is mostly back and healthy, and the Terriers just defeated the team picked to finish one spot ahead of them accordingly.
The best part, though? Seeing as he feels like this was only the fifth game of the season, Jones still thinks his group is only scratching the surface.
“We’re still not there yet, we’re not even close to being there,” he said. “We’re still good, we’re still good enough to win, but I think in a couple weeks, we could be really good.”
After watching the Terriers on Wednesday, if BU’s still got multiple extra levels in its future? Look out.