America East Basketball News & Notes: Two Weeks to Conference Season

With the holidays right around the corner, so too is the America East Conference season. January 2 is the start of league play with a full slate of games. The non-conference schedule has proven to be quite a success for the league. It continued last Monday night when Albany made an appearance at Boston College and defeated the Eagles by a 61-57 score. It marked the second win for America East vs the Atlantic Coast Conference. The other win was UMBC’s win over Pittsburgh. Right now, the league is in good shape to produce a very exciting league season in just two weeks. Here is what else is going on in the conference.

The Vermont Catamounts (7-4) are starting to put things together as league play nears. They have won four of their last six games with a winning percentage of .636. They are also the first team in the league to crack the Top-100 in the NET ranking. Vermont is at 93. The Catamounts did lose a game on Sunday when their scheduled game on the road at Northeastern was canceled because of Covid. Vermont is the best defensive team in the league allowing 59 points per game with a margin of 5.7 per contest. They are the second-best free-throw shooting team in the league at 73% as well as the best defensive rebounding team averaging 32 a night.

The Stony Brook Seawolves (7-4) picked up a couple of more wins last week against CCSU and St.Peters. The wins extended the team’s winning streak to four straight, and six of their last seven ball games. The Seawolves are second in the league in 3-point FG made (100 for 284, 35% in eleven games). Their nine made three’s per outing is third-best in the conference. In those same eleven games, opponents have been going to the free-throw line a lot hitting 62% 84 of 134. Putting teams at the foul line can prove to be a dangerous thing come league play.

The Maine Black Bears (3-6) have gotten off to a bit of a slow start. However, they do lead the league in a couple of different categories. The Black Bears are first in steals with 83 in nine games for an average of 9.22 a contest. They also lead in opponent’s free throw percentage as teams have gone to the line 151 times and made 109 for a 72% rate. Maine is having a bit of a problem putting the ball in the basket averaging 59 points per game, which has them next to last in America East.

NJIT (5-5) has lost two in a row. It has been eight days since their last game which was a 70-52 loss to Northwestern of the Big-10. In the game, the team was only able to shoot 29% from the field. Miles Coleman was really the only player that had any kind of a night for NJIT. He scored 20 points and pulled down eight boards. The defense has been asked to keep the team in games, and so far have done a pretty good job. They are second in FG percent defense at 38.9% (237-610 in ten games). They are second in 3-point FG defense at 29.7% (69-232). NJIT is first in the league in blocked shots 47 blocks in ten games for an average of 4.70 a game.

The Player of the Week is Jahill Jenkins of Stony Brook. He averaged 18 points, three and a half assists, and two steals in the Seawolves two wins last week. He scored a game-high 21 points and five assists in the win over Central Conn. State. For Jenkins, this is the second straight week he has been named Player of the Week.

The Rookie of the Week is Maine freshman guard Novak Perovic. In the win over the University of New England on Saturday, Perovic put together his best game as a Black Bear. He scored 10 points, five rebounds, and three steals in the victory. This is Novak’s first weekly honor.

This will give you some idea of how the league is shaping up as league play approaches. Next week we will look ahead to conference action.