From L-R: Amarri Monroe, Paul Otieno and Savion Lewis celebrate a Quinnipiac win. Bobcats’ three captains will look to validate their returns this season with MAAC championship this week. (Photo by Quinnipiac Athletics)
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — In a gold t-shirt and a backpack, Savion Lewis walked up to the podium, alongside fellow graduate student Matt Balanc and head coach Tom Pecora, to answer questions following Quinnipiac’s buzzer-beater loss to Saint Peter’s in last season’s MAAC semifinals.
At that point, it wasn’t known that Lewis would use another year of eligibility, his seventh in college basketball. It wasn’t known that he would enter the transfer portal to test the waters. And it certainly wasn’t known that he was going to be back in Hamden.
The only thing known in that moment was that Lewis felt the Peacocks had “brought it more” and that, looking back on his career from that table in Atlantic City, Quinnipiac “felt like a home.”
And yet, he came back.
Lewis, hungry — check that, starving — for a chance to rectify the team’s wrongs, returned for another season at that second home.
Lewis was a monster in 2024, but a year removed, he’s taken a step back. He’s not racking up the assists he did a season ago, and he doesn’t have the quick first step he did as a spry sophomore. Still, Lewis remains an invaluable part of a Bobcats team that, despite the presence of four returning starters, rotates a number of younger guys into the lineup.
“The veterans mean everything, like they're all leaders in practice, they’re all vocal,” freshman guard Jaden Zimmerman said. “Outside of practice, they're still talking to us, communicating, whether it's basketball or anything. (Lewis) takes nothing for granted. If he’s playing bad, he’s still gonna be a leader, still be Savion.”
Savion Lewis drives in Quinnipiac’s home win over Iona. (Photo by Quinnipiac Athletics)
So while Lewis, who finished second in the conference in assists per game (6.4), may not be a Quinnipiac Bobcat for much longer, he’s found a way to grow his mindset off the court.
“My whole life, I feel like my identity has been close to basketball,” Lewis said. “Throughout my time here, when I had my injuries, (I) found myself maturing outside the game.”
Maturation is almost a given when you’ve been playing college ball since 2018. But between a season-ending Achilles tear, a pandemic and the never-ending tweaks, bruises and heartbreak that accompany a Division I season, Lewis has had to deal with more than most.
But he’s back in the MAAC tournament, quarterbacking the bracket’s top team. Like most good quarterbacks, it’s time to forget the past and move onto the next snap. Now, Lewis is a few snaps away from finally clinching that elusive Super Bowl.
***
The incessant portal talk. Interest from other coaches. Dealing with reps from other schools. Amarri Monroe — fresh off a second team all-MAAC performance in his first year in blue and gold — just found it all exhausting.
“I ask that everyone give me and my family privacy at this time. An announcement will be made soon as to what my plans are for next year. Thank you,” an April 5 tweet from the sophomore read. A day later, Monroe announced his return.
But why come back? Why pass up the boatload of NIL opportunities he could inevitably elsewhere? In other words, why stay at the mid-major only half the country — on a good day — can pronounce?
Maybe it was a chance to finish the job after faltering on the tournament stage just a month before. Maybe it was to try to find a true place to call home instead of jumping in the portal for the second time. Hell, maybe it was to grab Balanc’s old number and trade his No. 15 in for No. 2, a number he says means a lot to him.
Monroe — who this year switched out not only the number on his back but the nameplate, too, after legally changing his surname from Tice — looked as though he had been shot out of a cannon to start the season, and he hasn’t looked back since. He led the conference in double-doubles (14), averaged 17.7 points per game in MAAC play and claimed Quinnipiac’s second consecutive and third total MAAC Player of the Year award (Balanc won it a year prior, joining Cameron Young in 2019).
“I’m just playing my game, and I’m not really worried about scoring,” Monroe said. “To be honest, I ask about rebounds more than I do how many points.”
On that point, his 9.2 rebounds per game topped the conference, and it’s another major reason why the Bobcats are among the nation’s best on both sides of the glass.
“Women lie. Men lie. Numbers don’t,” Lewis said matter-of-factly when asked why Monroe deserved to be crowned the conference’s best player. “You guys see him. You don’t have to keep trying to advocate for him. He’s done everything on the number one team. So it’s a no-brainer why he’s the player of the year.”
Along with his play, off-the-court Monroe has grown into a figure. He was named one of the Bobcats’ captains in just his second year, takes Quinnipiac’s freshmen under his wing and, for good measure, talks about Spongebob in postgame press conferences.
The leadership qualities the 22-year-old displays on the court extend far beyond the six sets of blue metal doors buttressing M&T Bank Arena. Monroe cares for his teammates — some of which are his roommates — and it’s evident in their relationship.
“He’s my guy. He’s like a big brother to me and he answers all my questions,” freshman forward Grant Randall said. “We just do everything together. We just talk, we just vibe out. And he’s a big leader on the court too. So he helps me a lot, even when I don’t feel right.”
“Mari’s different,” senior forward Alexis Reyes added. “He don’t take plays off. He plays hard every play, and that’s why I have to respect him. Every day, he comes and works hard.”
Amarri Monroe goes up for rebound. Junior forward was named MAAC Player of the Year, Bobcats’ second straight after Matt Balanc last year. (Photo by Quinnipiac Athletics)
So again, what convinced Monroe to come back to the Bobcats? The awards and conference recognition are certainly nice. He’s said repeatedly that he felt snubbed of last year’s Defensive Player of the Year honor and it was his goal to claim that trophy. While he fell short again this season, the MAAC’s top award will be a nice consolation prize. But there remains one thing left to check off the bucket list.
“We're starting to click as a team, like I said, we learn from our mistakes, and this is the most important time of the season,” Monroe said. “Teams either rise or fall, and we're not going to fall.”
***
When the horn sounded after the Bobcats’ 81-69 nationally-televised beating over Fairfield on January 31, the team instinctively bolted for the student section and started dapping up their fellow students. It wasn’t planned, really. It just sort of happened.
Towering shoulders above the dap-up scrum that evening was graduate forward Paul Otieno, a player referred to by his own coaches as a gentle giant. The 6-foot-8 figure from Nairobi, Kenya has donned a Quinnipiac jersey for each of the past three years, with the first two ending in tough tournament losses. He’s quiet in postgame pressers and tends to be very reserved when talking to the media.
It takes a good question to really open Otieno up. Just like when he and his teammates ran into the stands to celebrate the win, they are students after all.
“I don’t even know,” Otieno said through a laugh after being asked whose idea it was to celebrate in the stands. “(I was like) let’s go, we got the dub.”
Otieno may not be as vocal as, say, Monroe on the floor or behind a podium; instead, he lets his play do the talking. He earned a first team all-MAAC selection ahead of this week’s tournament, almost exactly a year removed from feeling as though he’d been robbed of a spot on any of the three all-star teams.
But he wouldn’t tell you that, it’s not his style. Instead, he quietly grabbed 13 double-doubles, finishing just behind Monroe. While his teammate would tell you about their overly-competitive rebounding competition, Otieno remains focused.
“Our front line with Paul and Amarri, when they’re going out and getting double doubles like that, they’re beasts,” Pecora said. “They’re tough to handle for opposing teams.”
Paul Otieno is introduced among Quinnipiac starters. Senior forward was first team all-MAAC selection this season. (Photo by Quinnipiac Athletics)
When the passing lanes are clogged and the Bobcats can’t shoot the lights out, they can just dump it off to Otieno in the paint. In the team’s late-season loss at Merrimack, he singlehandedly took control of the second half. At critical moments all season long, Otieno would casually drill a 3-pointer to open up the scoring, something he practiced to near-perfection over the offseason.
“We’re definitely doing something different this year, like last year, our defensive rating was down below,” Otieno said. “That's all we talk about. Add a little bit of offense, (makes) all the difference.”
It’s going to take something different to get this Quinnipiac team over the hump, and a lot of it starts with something that this team hasn’t had in a few years, a superstar center.
***
There’s a reason Quinnipiac has captured back-to-back regular season crowns. Lewis, Monroe and Otieno have anchored a team that, despite another 15-5 conference record, struggled at times. Its 3-point shooting has ranked among the worst in the country. Turnovers have plagued the Bobcats for stretches during games. Stationary offense has left the team vulnerable to scoreless ruts.
Yet somehow, the Bobcats find themselves in this moment, with a first-round bye and a mere three wins from something that’s never happened in THIS part of Connecticut. And while the captains are the team’s engines, breakout performances from Zimmerman, Reyes and sophomore guard Khaden Bennett have kept the wheels turning.
It’s another reason why Pecora has earned every part of the contract extension he inked last season, extending him through the 2028 season. In his two seasons as head coach, he’s won 30 conference games, the most by any MAAC men’s basketball coach in their first two seasons. Both years have ended with Pecora earning the conference’s Coach of the Year award, but he keeps chugging along, despite four head coaching stops and not one NCAA Tournament bid.
“I love coaching, man,” Pecora said. “I got the best job in the world. At times, it’s up and it’s down, but it’s competing. And I tell the guys all the time, the greatest skill they can have is the ability to compete, because that’s going to stay with you and carry you through life.”
Tom Pecora is still searching for elusive first NCAA Tournament trip as head coach after 16 years in Division I. (Photo by Quinnipiac Athletics)
So the Bobcats will compete to continue riding this wave. They waited three days and change for their matchup, and now have the eighth-seeded Rider Broncs on their plate. It’s a team that gave them trouble in the regular season, with Otieno being limited in both matchups and the first meeting being decided by a Monroe game-winner in the final seconds.
“We just gotta play a complete game,” Rider head coach Kevin Baggett said. “We know that we gotta keep them off the glass. We know Savion is good. We know Monroe is great. They have a good team. They're well coached, so we gotta really focus on making sure that we know what Savion is going to do, because, again, he's a great point guard, and you know what Monroe is going to do.”
What the Bobcats hope to do is control the glass, something that has been their bread and butter all throughout conference play. With Monroe and Otieno combining for 27 double-doubles, it’s tough to get a rebound against Quinnipiac. After missing one defensive board in last year’s final loss, it’s time for the MAAC’s best rebounding squad to fight for one more. It’s even tougher when the team rebounding that ball is desperate for another chance to play together.
“We fell short last year. We don't have that same feeling,” Monroe said. “We're just dialed in, you know? We're locked in, just making sure we won't make that same mistake we made last year.”
For some, it’s the last time they’ll play for the Bobcats. For others, it’s the final basketball game they’ll ever suit up for. Wednesday — and what the team hopes to be a longer stretch than in years past — is just another opportunity to play Bobcat basketball. A Quinnipiac-centric last dance, if you will.
“Understanding that it was my last year and not wanting to gamble that on what-ifs,” Lewis said. “Knowing that we had a great opportunity and there was unfinished business, when you taste that type of success last year and you’re like, right there, it’s almost something you can’t just walk away from.”
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