The game served as a confidence booster for BC, which had lost two of its last three to ranked opponents on the road. Back home and playing an inferior foe (Hartford was just 9-12 overall prior to Wednesday), the Eagles showed no mercy, shooting circles around the Hawks and claiming a blowout victory, 94-60.
“There’s no question that we offensively had a great performance,” head coach Al Skinner said after the game. “But as I told the players before the game, this game was as important as any other game we’re going to play the rest of the year. We’re at the point of the year where we need to capture every win that we possibly can.”
To prevent the Eagles from working the baseline, the Hawks played a zone and packed defenders down low. But that left the perimeter open, and BC made Hartford pay to the tune of a school record 14 three-pointers. Seven different Eagles hit from the outside, including two freshmen, Tyler Roche (who hit four) and Daye Kaba, who made their first career threes.
Roche was the surprise of the game. He hit four of six shot attempts, all from the perimeter, and dwarfed his previous career high of four points with a 12-point effort in 19 minutes off the bench.
Tyrese Rice had a double-double and set a new career mark with 13 assists. Tyrelle Blair came off a career day against Duke on Sunday with another solid performance. The junior transfer from Loyola-Chicago had six points, seven rebounds, and a career-high six blocks.
But like clockwork, the game’s best performance belonged to Jared Dudley. He didn’t miss. Dudley was 8-8 from the field, including 3-3 from behind the arc, to tally a game-high 21 points. He also added eight rebounds and six assists.
“It was a confidence boost to shoot so well,” Dudley said after the game. “I wasn’t shooting it very well at the beginning of the season so this gives me a lot of confidence.”
The Eagles barely missed from downtown in the first half, thanks to the hot shooting of some unlikely contributors. John Oates, who had made just nine three-pointers all season entering Wednesday, hit three from behind the arc in the first 5:47 of the game to pace the Eagles to a 14-7 start. Though as surprising as it was to see Oates connect on three of four attempts, the site of the junior forward popping a trey was not an unseen site for BC fans.
Roche, on the other hand, is a different story. Roche, a freshman forward from New Hampshire, entered the game at the 11:19 mark having scored just six points in his entire collegiate career. He had made just one field goal (of 11 attempts) and had never hit a three, until Wednesday night. Within 1:06 in the first half, Roche hit two consecutive threes: one from the left corner and the next from the right wing. With his two quick ones from long distance, Roche matched his entire scoring output for the season.
“I’m real happy for him,” Skinner said about Roche after the game. “He’s been working extremely hard in practice and he’s been playing with a lot more confidence in practice, so it was nice to see it translate to a game situation. I think he understood that he was going to have an opportunity to play some tonight and obviously he’s made the most of it.”
No one was as hot as Dudley, though. The senior co-captain had 13 points (including six in a row for the Eagles at one point) on 5-5 shooting. Dudley looked as confident shooting the ball as ever: He showed no hesitation pulling the trigger and not only did he not miss, he didn’t even hit the rim. Behind the arc, in the lane, from the elbow; Dudley hit from everywhere Wednesday night.
It was a dominant first half for BC and the statistics backed it up. The Eagles out-shot (70% to 39%, 57% to 33% from the perimeter), out-assisted (15-4), out-blocked (4-0), and out-rebounded (15-11) the Hawks. The result was a 47-30 lead at the break.
And they didn’t slow down in the second half. BC made its first eight shots of the half and extended its lead to 31 by the 12:52 mark. The nail in the coffin came early, about five minutes later. Up 28 with 8:05 remaining, Roche grabbed a Hartford miss, fired an outlet pass to Rice, who dished a lefty bounce pass to a streaking Dudley on the right side of a two-on-one breakaway. Dudley cocked back his right arm and threw down his 20th point of the night over a helpless defender.
With the game well in-hand, freshman Daye Kaba and fifth-year senior Tyler Neville, who had logged a combined total of 25 minutes off the bench this season, got into the game earlier than normal. They entered around the six- and five-minute marks (respectively) and provided the crowd with a little more to cheer about after the starters retired for the night.
After missing once from the left side, Kaba tried again after an offensive rebound and hit from the corner, drawing cheers from the crowd and giving the Eagles an 86-50 lead. Neville’s cheers were even louder when he drew a foul with just under a minute to play and forced Hartford’s Michael Turner to the bench with his fifth foul. But the two came together to please the 5,128 in attendance on the next possession. A Tyrelle Blair block (his sixth) led to a fast break and Neville dished down low to Kaba who soared with two hands for a dunk.
Next up for BC is Virginia Tech, at home on Saturday. It will be the first of eight-straight ACC games to end the season.