Sacred Heart humbled in loss to BU

By Pete Janny (@pete_janny)

FAIRFIELD, Conn. — After a disappointing 70-49 home loss to Boston University, Sacred Heart head coach Anthony Latina admitted he and his team have to go back to the drawing board. The game ended on a 25-7 run for BU over the last 9:40 and rekindled new defensive questions for the Northeast Conference favorites.

“I think they just wore us down physically and mentally,” Latina said after the game. “They broke us. We need to be mentally tougher to withstand that and right through it.”

After giving up 90 points against New Hampshire Thursday night, Sacred Heart looked motivated on the defensive end in the first half against BU. The Pioneers weren’t giving up much easily. and more importantly, forced early turnovers on the Terriers. Sacred Heart  became so indomitable on that end of the floor that BU underwent a nine-minute stretch with only two points. The active defense boosted the offense, with Sacred Heart amassing a 15-0 run to lead by as many as seven points in the first half.

“I thought our defense was very good in the first half,” said Latina, whose team limited BU’s leading scorer, Miles Brewster, to two points over the first 20 minutes.

However, Sacred Heart’s downfall began late in the first half when BU launched an 8-0 run to close the half with a 26-25 lead. Once the Pioneers couldn’t find much offensive success to start the second half, the game flipped for good. Against BU’s dogged guards, Sacred Heart had trouble getting into the paint and was forced to settle for tough looks. Leading scorer Nico Galette was held in check, too, and never really came close to taking command of Sacred Heart’s offensive attack like he is  accustomed to doing.

“In fairness to him, he made a lot of hard shots against New Hampshire,” Latina said about Galette, who finished with 13 points but was held to 1-of-5 shooting from 3-point range. “Our offense has to get better. We have to teach it better and coach it better.”

The 49 points were a season-low scoring output through nine games, after being held to 55 points at Saint Joseph’s last Sunday. On this occasion, it was Aidan Carpenter who saved face for his squad by tallying 12 points on an efficient 5-of-10 shooting from the floor. Carpenter, who seems to play too conservative at times, saw his aggressiveness pay off in a performance which included hitting two threes before the halfway mark of the first half.

“He’s been doing some good things and his defense is getting better,” Latina said of Carpenter, fresh off his third double-digit scoring performance this  season. “He needed a little more help today.”

The threes simply wouldn’t fall as much as Sacred Heart needed them to. Overall, the Pioneers were just 6-for-26 from long range to close out a bad week of shooting. Over their last three games, Latina’s team shot a combined 15-of-64 from long distance.

“Threes are not dropping for us right now,” he said. “Their defense had a lot to do with it. When we did get open ones, we couldn’t knock them down.”

Even more disappointing  was the way Sacred Heart allowed its shooting struggles to affect their defense. Defending the 3-point line became an issue, as BU hit eight second-half threes to pull away. Inside, the Terriers pulled down four offensive reboinds in the second half as the paint started opening up for the visitors as well.

‘Our lack of basket making impacted our defense,” Latina said. “We were certainly humbled today by BU and that’s how college basketball works. We have to bounce back.”

The key for Sacred Heart will be getting an offense that has scored over 80 points six times back on track. While the shots aren’t falling now, that should change once the Pioneers establish more ball movement in the halfcourt and work to improve their assist totals after failing  to reach double-digit assists in each of their last three losses.

“This was as bad an offensive performance as you can have,” Latina said. “We are a low-assist team right now and aren’t looking for each other.”

BU was led by Matai Baptiste’s 12 points and nine points apiece from Otto Landrum and Ethan Okwuosa.