Senior priority: win

If you see Margaret McKeon at games, just call her “involved.” The Boston University women’s basketball coach moves around and makes as much noise as the crowd.

But, if you really see Margaret McKeon at work – if you really take the time to see the person along with the coach – you may see how involved she really is, in every watchmaker-precise detail of her team. Look even further, and you see the heart of a true coach, the heart of someone who’s been there.

As her team sits in the midst of a 1-3 slump with two games remaining before the America East Tournament – including tonight’s Senior Night against the University at Albany – they need that wisdom.

“The senior game is one game I still remember when I played,” she said. “I know that these seniors and every senior would want to be in that position [with a win] … I have a special bond with Marisa [Moseley], Katie [Terhune] and Lashaunda [Mitchell], a bond I’ll never forget. It’ll be an emotional day for me.”

With only one of those three seniors in the active lineup – Mitchell has been out all season with a knee injury and Moseley is resting her injured knee before tournament time – the Terriers (15-10, 10-6 America East) will look to reverse their recent troubles with a win over the Great Danes (11-14, 8-8) and make the night a bright one for the seniors.

Now sitting at third in the league after dropping their second-place scrum to Binghamton University on Saturday, the Terriers have the ability to finish anywhere from second to fifth in the conference. As Binghamton prepares to play the University of Vermont and fourth-place University of Hartford, the Terriers play destiny’s puppeteer.

And McKeon is making sure the correct strings are pulled.

“Why are we being so wimpy?” cascaded off the walls of “The Roof” just as her players were colliding off of each other at practice on Monday. But the bright red faces and sips of water between gasps for breath spoke otherwise at the water break a minute later.

Later on, so did McKeon.

“I thought today was a really good practice,” she said, “and I think the freshmen are getting better from this experience of being in late game situations … I think this is going to make us that much stronger for the tournament.”

The Terriers, who had been roaring when they beat Albany 77-60 on Jan. 31, come into the second day of March playing the part of lambs. That win – their third in a row, came when the team had just started to put together one beautiful jigsaw puzzle of a season.

Four players scored in double figures on the night, led by junior Becky Bonner’s 19 points, and the team outrebounded the Great Danes 45-30. Things were clicking more than pens at exam time.

Four games later, the women were the proud owners of the second-longest winning streak in BU history as they took on Maine at Case Gym. Leaving with a 67-64 loss to the Black Bears, they also left a different team.

When Moseley went down that game with a partially torn MCL, the team was forced to make the puzzle a far smaller one. Since then, the play in the paint that had been so bright became a darker shade, as the team has had to rely on a smaller lineup than the one they sent out the first time against the Danes.

“We’re going to change up our starting lineup, because having certain players coming off the bench is going to be a benefit for us,” McKeon said. “I think the best thing to do is to go small then go big, instead of big and going small.”

The whole process is to reassemble those puzzle pieces into a picture that will work, at least until Moseley returns, McKeon said.

“We haven’t really played our best basketball,” she said, “but what I tried to explain to our team is that we could have easily been 4-0 instead of 1-3 in the past four games if we would’ve buckled down … They need to find a way to buckle down and start playing as a cohesive unit.

“There’s no need to hit the panic button,” McKeon continued. “We just need to make a couple more plays to come out with a ‘W,’ and it’s that simple.”