January 28, 2010

BULLDOGS LOOK FOR SEASON'S FIRST WIN AT HOME, HOST FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON THURSDAY NIGHT (7:30 P.M.) 

Game Notes / Live Stats / Watch Live / Listen Live

SMITHFIELD, R.I. -- The Bryant University men's basketball team will look to get its first win of the 2009-10 season Thursday night as they host Northeast Conference opponent Fairleigh Dickinson University at the Chace Athletic Center at 7:30 p.m. The contest, the second between the two teams this month, will be broadcast live on WOON 1240-AM and on www.bryantbulldogs.tv.

THE PARTICULARS
Bryant welcomes Fairleigh Dickinson University to the Chace Athletic Center for a rematch of the teams' Jan. 7 bout. The Bulldogs are still looking for their first win of the season and look to get it against the Knights, who they topped in their only meeting of 2008-09 but fell to earlier this year on the road, 66-50.

THE SERIES
This is just the third meeting between Bryant and FDU, and the Bulldogs look to repeat last season's outing against the Knights, a game the Black and Gold won at the Chace Athletic Center, 56-43. But it was the Knights who took the opening bout of the 2009-10 season series with a 66-50 victory at Stratis Arena on Jan. 7.

In this season's earlier outing, rookie leading scorer Vlad Kondratyev (Nikolayev, Ukraine) and senior captain Adam Parzych (Lindenhurst, N.Y.) paced the Bulldogs with 16 and 10 points, respectively, while Parzych also led the visiting Black and Gold on the glass with seven rebounds. Bryant committed a season-high 26 fouls in the contest, sending the Knights to the line 30 times.

SCOUTING THE KNIGHTS
Fairleigh Dickinson enters Thursday's contest off a 78-75 win over Saint Francis (PA) at home Saturday and is 5-15 on the season with an even 4-4 conference record. A quartet of Knights average double-digit points, led by NEC Preseason All-Conference selection Sean Baptiste's 14.1 points per game. Alvin Mofunanya (12.3 ppg), Terence Grier (11.3 ppg) and Mike Scott (12.2 ppg) follow suit while Mofunanya also leads the team in rebounding average (6.8 rpg) and blocks (31). Scott, the only FDU player to start in all 20 games this season, quarterbacks the Knights' offense, dishing out 97 assists and averages a team-high 36.0 minutes per game. The Knights shoot 40.8 percent as a team but aren't as strong from the line, converting on just 63.8 percent of their nearly 500 freebie opportunities. The Knights and the Bulldogs faced off against one similar non-conference opponent this year, both falling to Army.

BRYANT vs. THE NORTHEAST CONFERENCE
Bryant is 0-8 against its home conference in 2009-10, having played its first official game against the NEC back on December 3, 2009 when the Bulldogs fell to LIU, 62-46. All-time against current Northeast Conference opponents, the Bulldog basketball program is 34-68, having most frequently played former Northeast-10 Conference (DII) members Quinnipiac (16-37). Bryant continues to play its full league slate in 2010 after going 6-8 against the NEC last season, taking wins over Quinnipiac (twice), LIU, Fairleigh Dickinson, Saint Francis (PA) and Monmouth.

LAST TIME OUT
Freshman leading scorer Vlad Kondratyev (Nikolayev, Ukraine) poured in a career-high 20 points to lead the Bryant men's basketball team against Sacred Heart on the road Saturday afternoon, but it wouldn't be enough to get the Bulldogs their first win of the season as they fell to the Pioneers, 84-60, at the Pitt Center.

Bryant was outscored by just eight points, 39-31, in the second frame but couldn't overcome a 16-point halftime deficit, as the home side never trailed in the contest.

Kondratyev's 20 points came off a career-best eight baskets as the rookie went 8-for-11 for the field and a perfect 4-for-4 from the line in 22 minutes of action. He also knotted his career mark for rebounds with a team-high five. Senior captain Adam Parzych (Lindenhurst, N.Y.) was the only other Bulldog to register double-figure scoring, tying his season high with 16 points on 4-of-6 shooting. All four of his buckets came from beyond the arc, where he went 4-for-5 on the day, and the guard added four more points from the charity stripe. As a team, Bryant was strong from the line on the day, converting a season-high 15-of-18 attempts while allowing the Pioneers just 16 chances (nine points).

Just 1:15 into the contest, the Bulldogs would knot the score at 5-5, marking the only tie of the game. From there, Sacred Heart would score 11-straight points as part of a 15-4 run that left Bryant with a 20-9 deficit with 11:40 left to play in the first. The Bulldogs would close the gap to eight with a 3-pointer from Parzych 16 seconds later, but the Pioneers regained a double-digit lead at the 9:03 mark and would keep it for the remainder of the game.

Parzych proved deadly from long distance for the Black and Gold throughout the contest, converting on all three of his first-half attempts from 3-point land to lead the team with 11 points at the break. A pair of Pioneers were in the double figures after the opening 20, led by 15 points from senior Corey Hassan, who went 5-for-9 from the field including 2-for-5 from downtown.

Sacred Heart suffered just a single turnover in the first half to the Bulldogs' seven, resulting in 14 points off Bulldog miscues for the home side. The Pioneers also doubled Bryant up on the glass, outrebounding the visiting Bulldogs, 16-8.

Out of the break, Sacred Heart started the second frame shooting 75 percent through the first 9:41 and opened up a 67-37 advantage, thanks in part to 11 points from Hassan. But the Bulldogs weren't running up the white flag just yet, answering with seven-straight points of their own to close the gap to 67-44 in favor of the home side, a run that included a powerful dunk from Kondratyev off a great feed from Parzych with 9:57 to play. Kondratyev would draw the foul on the play and convert the and-one free throw.

With 4:22 to play, senior captain Chris Birrell (Scituate, R.I.) was fouled on a breakaway three, making all three free throws to move the score to 79-55, but the game was too far out of reach. Still, Bryant held the Pioneers to just two baskets in the final 6:05 of the contest.

Bryant kept its foul count down, matching the Pioneers' 18 on the day, but ran its second-half infractions up early on in the frame, committing five fouls in the span of 49 seconds. Kondratyev recorded two of the Bulldogs' three blocks in the game, the most impressive of which came with 16:44 left on the clock when he appeared out of nowhere to reject a Hassan close-range jumper.

The Bulldogs shot 46.5 percent on the day after shooting at a 52.6 percent clip in the first frame. Sacred Heart would hit at a rate of 57.1 percent on the afternoon and was led by 26 points from Hassan and 21 from Ryan Litke. Each team committed nine turnovers in the final 20 minutes, while the Pioneers outrebounded the Bulldogs, 32-20.

UP NEXT
Bryant stays at home for its longest homestand of the season, hosting two more Northeast Conference contests at the Chace Athletic Center before returning to the road. The Bulldogs' next matchup will come on Saturday, Jan. 30 against Monmouth at 3:30 p.m. before Bryant rounds out its three-game homestand with a 7:30 bout against Central Connecticut on Feb. 4, the first of consecutive contests against the Blue Devils.

BRYANT COACHING STAFF TO PARTICIPATE IN COACHES vs. CANCER SATURDAY AGAINST MONMOUTH
The Bryant University men's basketball coaching staff will show its support of the National Association of Basketball Coaches and the American Cancer Society by participating in the 2010 Coaches vs. Cancer Suits and Sneakers awareness weekend. On Jan. 30 against Monmouth, head coach Tim O'Shea and his staff will don sneakers with their regular game suits to help unite coaches across the country in the common effort to raise awareness for the fight against cancer.

At least one-third of cancer deaths could be avoided with a healthy diet and regular exercise. By wearing sneakers, our coaches are helping to education people about the fight and about the importance that nutrition and physical activity plays in reducing the risk of the disease. Together, we can save lives.