Less than two weeks ago, the St. Joseph’s University men’s basketball team strolled into Boston College’s Conte Forum and embarrassed the Eagles, 85-58.
Three nights later, Boston University visited BC and was defeated soundly, 80-61.
Tonight, the Terriers (3-2) travel to Philadelphia to face St. Joe’s (3-0) in what will be one of the toughest tests for BU all year. Based on both teams’ performances against the Eagles, it would seem that BU has no shot tonight, but those scores can be deceiving.
‘I know [St. Joe’s] beat BC by [about] 20 and BC beat us by [about] 20,’ BU Coach Dennis Wolff said with a laugh when asked what he knew about the Hawks. ‘But comparative scores don’t mean anything.
‘Every night is a new night and what they did to BC or what BC did to us is irrelevant.’
Regardless of what happened against BC, St. Joe’s is a smart team that plays great defense and has a legitimate star in junior guard Jameer Nelson.
Nelson, who is averaging 21 points and five assists per game this season, will provide another stiff challenge for the Terriers’ backcourt, which has played great defense all season, with the exception of the BC game.
After limiting Harvard University’s star playmaker Patrick Harvey to only six points, junior captain Kevin Fitzgerald will try to control another star guard. The BU guards will have to play even better defense tonight, as players like Nelson can’t be found on Harvard’s roster.
Against the Eagles, Nelson scored 22 points and dished out eight assists while helping to force BC guard Troy Bell into a 2-for-14 shooting nightmare.
In addition to Nelson, the Hawks are led by sophomore guard Delonte West, who is averaging 17.3 points and 6.3 rebounds a game. The last time the Terriers faced a backcourt tandem this good was against BC when Bell and Ryan Sidney lit them up for 46 combined points.
‘We need to bring the toughness we brought [against Harvard],’ junior guard Matt Turner said. ‘We need to keep improving offensively and keep playing real good defense like we have been, except for the BC game.’
Turner’s play will also be crucial to the Terriers’ success tonight. After struggling through the early part of the season, he appears to have turned a corner with his play, starting against Dartmouth on Saturday and continuing against Harvard, when he carried the team to victory in the last six minutes.
Tonight’s game will be the Terriers’ fifth road game out of six played so far this season. After St. Joe’s, BU will return home for contests with George Washington University and Ohio University.
‘We’re playing three very good teams,’ Turner said. ‘We all need to be on top of our games to win this.’
The Terriers have scheduled more non-conference games against teams from power conferences this year than in the recent past. At the outset of the year, the team and coaching staff talked about how badly they wanted to win one or more of these games. After dropping games to Stanford University and BC, BU would love to knock off St. Joe’s, a win that would make people around the country notice the Terriers.
‘These are the types of games the kids really look forward to playing,’ Wolff said.
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