Game Notes & Preview: Providence (4-2, 0-0) vs New Hampshire (4-2, 0-0) 11/30/16

Where: Dunkin’ Donuts Center – Providence, RI

When: 6:30pm EST

How: FS2 (Alex Faust & Tarik Turner)/WEEI 103.7 FM and Friars.com (John Rooke and Joe Hassett)/FriarTV

Game Notes

• Providence and New Hampshire will meet for the 16th time ever on Wednesday. The Friars lead the all-time series, 14-1. The last time Providence played New Hampshire was December 20, 2011 and the Friars won, 67-52.
• Providence is 55-6 all-time against teams from the America East conference. The Friars defeated the America East preseason favorite Vermont earlier this season. They have one more game against an America East opponent this season when they’ll face-off against the Maine Bears.
• New Hampshire is 4-2 this season. They defeated Temple on the road in their first game of the season against another Division 1 opponent and then dropped two straight to Abilene Christian and West Virginia. They have won their last two contests, which were on November 23rd at home against Detroit Mercy and November 27th at Winthrop. The Wildcats are led by Bill Herrion, who is in his 12th season at the helm of the New Hampshire program. They were picked second in the preseason America East poll behind Vermont. Junior Tanner Leissner leads the Wildcats in scoring at 17.3 points/game and rebounding, averaging 10.5 rebounds/game.
• Opening Line: Providence -11.5 vs New Hampshire 11/30/16

Game Preview

Providence is coming off a successful trip to Florida last week where they returned to Friartown with a 1-1 record. They defeated Memphis in the semifinals of the 2016 Emerald Coast Classic and then dropped the finals game against then 7th-ranked Virginia. The Cavaliers have since moved up to 6th in the AP poll out on Monday this week. New Hampshire is coming off back-to-back wins, including a road triumph at Winthrop on Sunday. The Wildcats also boast a win at Temple, a team that had an impressive showing in Brooklyn over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend by defeating Florida State and West Virginia — both teams ranked in the top-25 last week — to take the NIT Season Tipoff trophy. The Friars and Wildcats will be looking to finish off November with wins. New Hampshire finishes their non-conference schedule in December with 3 games against Patriot league teams, 1 game against an Ivy league team and 2 games against Division 3 teams. Providence has their in-state rivalry game against the Rhode Island Rams looming on Saturday.

The probable starters according to the game notes are:

Providence

• Kyron Cartwright – #24 – Junior
• Ryan Fazekas – #35 – Sophomore
• Jalen Lindsey – #21 – Junior
• Rodney Bullock – #5 – Junior
• Emmitt Holt – #15 – Junior

New Hampshire

• Jordan Reed – #11 – Junior
• Daniel Dion – #5 – Senior
• Jaleen Smith – #0 – Senior
• Tanner Leissner – #21 – Junior
• Iba Camara – #12 – Junior

The keys to victory will be to force turnovers on defense and feed the ball inside on offense. New Hampshire has turned the ball over at a 32.6% clip when pressed this season, which hasn’t happened on a ton of their possessions but West Virginia and their notorious press was able turn the Wildcats over a whopping 34 times. The Wildcats have only blocked 6.4% of shots at the rim, which ranks 284th nationally, per Hoop-Math.com. Players are shooting 62.8% on shots at the rim against them this season and that ranks 252nd nationally. Look for Ed Cooley to break out the press a bit against the Wildcats and then feed the ball to Emmitt Holt, Kalif Young and Rodney Bullock inside.

***Note the start time of 6:30pm EST***

Prediction: Providence 65 New Hampshire 55

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Mike Hopkins

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