Men’s Basketball Preview: Boston College vs. Maine

As preface to this preview, I just want to note that I had to include Coach Christian’s mask wearing in the article’s thumbnail. It has been something that has been irking me since the start of the season and needs to be put on full blast because it is has been rather bothersome to look at. Hopefully he got some tips during the past week or so on how to properly wear one when on the court.

Anyways, for those of you still on the BC Men’s Basketball bandwagon, the Eagles will be diving back into action against a rather inferior opponent, the Maine Black Bears. While us Eagles fans usually expect to see this type of matchup taking place on the ice rink, this game was fairly impromptu with Cal opting out of traveling east given the growing nature of the pandemic. To no surprise, BC grabbed a North East opponent that might also prove to be as a small morale boost of a win that this team so desperately needs.

Due to COVID 19 and its uncertainty in college basketball scheduling, Maine had their first three games of the season cancelled. So they have only played two games prior to meeting the Eagles. Both of their matches were against the same opponent, the Hartford Hawks. In both of those contests, the Black Bears walked away defeated, by score margins of 3 and 15. Granted it is a small sample size, but Maine does not seem like a very prolific scoring team. In those two games, they only average 55 PPG, shooting 40% from the field as a team. Furthermore, like BC, they are turnover happy committing 16.5 TOs a game on average. This early in the season, it appears that the main players to keep an eye on for Maine are guard LeChaun Duhart, who in his series against Hartford averaged a stat line of 11 PTS | 2 RBs | 2 APG, and sophomore Forward Stephane Ingo who put together a line of 7 PTS | 6.5 RBS | 3 BLKs. These are still clearly not the most attention grabbing numbers. To be honest, nobody from Maine has really stood out amongst the pack since their first two games were clearly rough outings.

Meanwhile, BC is riding a four game losing streak and coming off of an absolute throttling against Syracuse. At this point, this team need some type of easy victory to try to instill a little of confidence, and Maine is certainly a good target. A lot of people are continuing to call for Coach Christian’s head to be placed on the guillotine after that last loss to Syracuse and rightfully so. I do not think that a victory against an inferior team like Maine will really stop those pleas from happening. However, this is an opportunity for BC to actually practice some play design, execution and overall fundamentals against an opponent.

Prediction

Currently, there is no spread for this game and even if there was I would say do not bother spending a cent on it. For BC, this should be a cakewalk of a win based off of the sheer talent differentials. However, we have seen BC play either up or down to their opponent’s level time-and-time again, and I would not be surprised if this happens again to this team. What I am hoping for is that BC comes out and makes this a statement win against a low-tier opponent and wins by 20+ easily. Will that happen? Only time will tell, but at the very least I cannot envision the Eagles collapsing in this one. If they do, then I would not expect Coach Christian to have a good start to his New Year.

Prediction: Boston College 78 Maine 62