WALTHAM, Mass. – Two of the hottest teams in Northeast-10 Conference men's basketball will square off Tuesday night when the Bentley University Falcons host Southern New Hampshire University Penmen in the regular season finale.
The 7:30 pm game will be streamed live via NE10 NOW on FloCollege.
Bentley has won seven straight games and 11 of its 13 while Southern New Hampshire is 8-2 in its last ten games. The hot stretches have left both teams with identical 17-8 overall records.
In conference play, the Falcons are 14-5 and tied with Pace for second place while the Penmen are 13-6 and tied with Assumption for fourth. All four are assured of first-round byes when the NE10 Championships get underway Friday night.
Bentley's most recent win came Saturday at American International, 87-72, with all five Falcon starters making at least three treys. Junior guard
Cash McClure (Readfield, Maine/Marancook HS) led the scoring with 23 points and sophomore guard
Cooper Farrall (Valparaiso, Ind./Culver Academies) followed with 20.
The Falcons totaled 16 three-pointers, the fourth consecutive game in which they've made at least 13 from deep. Over that span, coach
Jay Lawson's club has connected at a .449 clip from downtown.
Lawson has gone with the same starting five throughout the last 15 games. McClure, Farrall and graduate guard
Aaron Latham (Glastonbury, Conn./Glastonbury HS) have started every game, junior forward
Joe Carroll (Cedar Grove, N.J./Don Bosco Prep) has started the last 21 and graduate forward
Ivan Misic (Toronto, Ont.) has been a fixture in the lineup since Jan. 2
McClure and Farrall are both in the top five in scoring, with averages of 16.8 and 16.7 respectively, and each is also among the conference's top rebounders. Latham scores 11.8, Misic follows at 10.6 and Carroll provides 6.4 per game.
Off the bench, junior forward
Chase Clarke (Bloomfield, N.J./Newark Academy) averages 8.5 points and 5.5 rebounds. He's also had five assists in each of the last two games.
As a team, Bentley leads the NE10 in shooting, both overall (.477) and from three (.381), and is second in scoring (79.8), three-pointers made (10.1) and rebound margin (+4.7).
SNHU, coached by former Bentley captain and assistant coach Jack Perri, is coming off a nail-biting 75-72 win over NE10 regular season champion Adelphi on Saturday, a game that saw senior guard Brendan Choate set career-highs for points (20) and rebounds (8). For the season, he averages 3.5 points and 2.9 rebounds.
The Penmen have been without leading scorer Ray Daniels (17.8 ppg) since mid-January, but have the conference's top rebounder in Paul Greene. He averages 12.9 points and 12.3 boards.
In the earlier meeting between the two programs, Lawson's Falcons defeated Perri's Penmen, 82-74, with McClure scoring 17 of his 26 points in the second half. Bentley shot better, 53-37 percent, and had the rebound advantage, 41-34.
Bentley is 7-2 in its last nine games against Southern New Hampshire, and 35-29 all-time against the Penmen.
Bentley's postseason will start Sunday with a Northeast-10 quarterfinal game.
