Niagara’s White won’t be ready for start of season

LaSalle transfer Devon White, who is recovering from an Achilles injury, will not be expected to start the season with the Niagara Purple Eagles.

“It’s hard to even guess as to when he’d be back,” Niagara coach Joe Mihalach said. “I don’t think he’ll be ready at the beginning of the season.”

Mihalach said Friday that he has not seen White since the summer session ended. Players began to return to campus over labor day weekend for the fall semester.

White, when he’s ready to play, is expected to fill the center spot and bolster the frontcourt for a team that finished 14-19 last season.

“Hoping he can help plug the middle up there for us,”  Mihalach said of what he expects from White. “We felt like it was one of the areas last year where we just needed to be better at because we’re so excited about the other four spots but that middle is just a position that we need to get a little more production out of it.”

White started six of 32 games last season for the Explorers, averaging 5.8 points per game, graduated from LaSalle in May and will use his final year of eligibility at Niagara. However it appears he will have to wait until he recovers from the injury to play in his final season.

“I think it’s pretty fair to say that I don’t think he will be playing at the beginning of the season,” Mihalach said.

Niagara begins their season with the 2K Sports Classic where they will travel to Oregon State on Nov. 9th. After that, they will host a sub-regional of the 2K  Sports Classic which will include home games against Bucknell and New Mexico State. Niagara’s non-conference schedule includes road trips to play NCAA Tournament teams Notre Dame, St. Bonavenutre as well a home game against defending America East champion Vermont.

Mihalach said their non-conference schedule will help sharpen them for conference play.

“We try to serve a lot of masters with that non-confernece schedule,” Mihalach said. “We want to play some really good teams, we want to play some teams that are going to be like the teams in our league, we want to get on the road a little bit, we want to try to play in a tournament if we can. It can always be a little better but I think we’re trying to accomplish those [goals].”