Men’s basketball seeks to avenge loss versus Lehigh

The Boston University men’s basketball team will return for a one-game home stand when conference foe Lehigh University comes to Case Gym Sunday.

So far this season, the Terriers (11-11, 4-5 Patriot League) have endured a mixture of results, suffering from losing streaks before rattling off multiple victories. Most recently, the team snapped a two-game losing stretch with a 76-67 win at the United States Military Academy Wednesday.

Despite struggling to gain momentum as the regular season winds down, there are key aspects of BU’s game that are improving. An example is the Terrier’s 3-point defense. In its last two games, BU held Bucknell University and the Black Knights (12-8, 3-5 Patriot League) to a combined 12-of-46 from deep.

This will also likely factor into Sunday’s result, as Lehigh is second in the Patriot League in 3-point field goal shooting with 37.6 percent.

“We were getting crushed at the 3-point line,” said BU head coach Joe Jones. “We kind of revamped our defense. We felt like in the non-conference [games], we did a really good job of making teams shoot the kind of shot we wanted them to shoot. Once we got in the league [games], we haven’t been nearly as efficient defensively. Teams have shot a high percentage overall and a very high percentage from three. But I think we’ve done a better job of talking about it and getting our guards there.”

Sunday’s game will be the second meeting this season between the Terriers and the Mountain Hawks (6-13, 4-4 Patriot League). They squared off Jan. 2 when Lehigh held on for a 81-73 win.

Despite senior Nathan Dieudonne and sophomore Nick Havener combining for 30 points, the star of that game was Tim Kempton, the reigning Patriot League Player of the Year. The junior power forward led all scorers with 22 points and totaled 11 rebounds en route to the victory.

Kempton has had a stellar season up to this point, as he ranks fourth in the Patriot League in scoring with 17.3 points per game and third in rebounds with 7.9 per game. He also stands at eighth in the conference in field goal percentage and ninth in free throw percentage.

Jones was quick to point out that it’s not just Kempton who gives opposing teams nightmares. Junior guard Austin Price averages 14.3 points per game this season, and freshman guard Kyle Leufroy dropped 20 points on the Terriers in their game.

“You got to kind of pick your poison with their team,” Jones said. “They have a lot of other guys that can hurt you. [Kempton] might be a guy that ends up scoring a ton, but you got to hold the other guys down. I don’t know if we can hold the other guys down and him.”

Jones believes that his team’s defensive game plan may depend on who is scoring well for Lehigh during the game.

“If you go down, you want to figure out what’s the best way for you to play them,” he said. “[Kempton] scoring is what we might have to get in terms of playing him 1-on-1 now. We can’t let him get 22, but if he gets his average and we do a good job with the rest of the guys, that can spell success for us.”

With a team as offensively talented as the Mountain Hawks, the Terriers will have to excel on defense if they wish to climb the Patriot League rankings. In their previous game, Lehigh shot 45.2 percent from the field, 58.8 percent from the 3-point line and 93.8 percent from the charity stripe.

“Overall, we just got to do a better job,” Jones said. “We got to do a better job defending. I would say that’s the big thing. We’ve proven that we can score enough to win, now can we stop them?”

Jones lamented his team’s defensive efforts in the previous game, and said he expects the team to perform much better this time around.

“We did not do a very good job of defending Kyle Leufroy,” Jones said. “Kempton really hurt us and Price hurt us. We really did not stop anybody. We got to come up with a game plan and be able to shut some guys down, whether it’s going to be Kempton on the inside or their perimeter guys on the outside.”