The Boston University men’s basketball team wrapped up its 2015-16 season Monday with an 83-72 loss to the New Jersey Institute of Technology in the CollegeInsiders.com Tournament.
Despite the sour ending, there were many positives to take away from the Terriers’ (19-15, 11-7 Patriot League) season. BU head coach Joe Jones led his squad to a third-place finish, largely in part to a seven-game win streak in the second half of its schedule.
Several Terriers also picked up conference awards at the end of the season. Junior guard Eric Fanning claimed All-Conference First Team honors after leading BU in scoring with 15.2 points per game. Not to be outdone, freshman point guard Kyle Foreman averaged 3.9 assists per game en route to earning a spot on the All-Rookie Team. Finally, senior forward Nathan Dieudonne was named to the Patriot League All-Defensive Team.
Even Jones received recognition, as he was named Patriot League Coach of the Year by NBCSports.com.
“I was very pleased with a large part of our season,” Jones said. “Obviously there were some disappointments at the end, but usually that’s going to happen unless you win the whole thing. If you had to take a hard look at it and told me that we’d lose [senior forward] Justin Alston and [junior guard] Cedric Hankerson for nearly the whole season and we’d still come in third place, I’d be pretty happy with that.”
One of the most impressive parts of the season is how Jones and the team survived several injuries to important players. Hankerson, arguably the team’s best player from 2014-15, played only one game all year. Alston started seven games for BU before missing the rest of the season. Besides them, Dieudonne, Foreman and sophomore guards Eric Johnson and Will Goff missed a combined 49 contests with injuries throughout the year.
The significant amount of injuries, however, ended up creating a platform for other players to shine. Most notably, sophomore forward Nick Havener averaged 21 minutes in 34 games this season, a year after playing only 16 games. The Sarasota, Florida native scored 6.7 ppg and grabbed 6.1 rebounds per game, the latter of which was good for second on the team.
Likewise, both sophomore guard Cheddi Mosely and junior center Blaise Mbargorba played an increased role and did well in the process. Mosely averaged 13.3 ppg this year and hit 70 3-pointers, while Mbargorba finished fourth on the team in rebounds and second in blocks.
“The thing that I take from the overall experience was that we have a lot of good players,” said Jones, who used 14 different starting lineups in the regular season due to injuries. “We had some guys really step up when they needed to, and there were guys going into the year that may or may not have been set to play a big role, but they stepped up and got it done. I think it was a very good year for what we went through. I feel very good about the future of our program.”
The Terriers started their conference schedule slowly, totaling a 3-5 record after eight games. However, BU would soon find its identity, and they went on a tear of seven straight wins. The winning streak included a 75-73 win versus Lehigh University, where senior guard John Papale hit a buzzer-beater that earned the top spot on SportsCenter’s top-10 list.
BU rode that momentum into the Patriot League Tournament, yet it was unable to get past a tough American University team, falling 69-64 in the quarterfinal round. The Terriers earned an invite to the CIT, and the team would perform like their old selves in the first round, defeating Fordham University 69-66 in a physical game.
Although BU failed to get past the second round of the tournament and will lose Papale and Dieudonne to graduation, Jones was still impressed by the environment his players have cultivated.
“The thing I’m most pleased about is the culture of our program is very good,” Jones said. “Guys have a very good understanding of what we’re trying to do and what we’re trying to get done. That’s the big thing. If the culture is good, then when adversity strikes, you’re still about to have success. That’s what we showed.”
