Almost one year ago Stony Brook met Marist, an arrangement made in October, and the two programs appeared to be going in the same direction.
The Seawolves prevailed on the road with a 60-57 win on the way to a school-record 25 win season, while Marist was dealt a difficult lesson. They would endure a 10-21 season which culminated in the firing of Chuck Martin.
The Red Foxes open with a new regime, under former Hornets general manager Jeff Bower as head coach, but both teams return solid cores and captains Jay Bowie, Adam Kemp and Chavaughn Lewis will look to avenge last season’s opening loss.
Marist was able to use their athleticism to come back, after the Seawolves led by as many as 12, closing the gap and taking a lead in the final five minutes.
“There’s a lot of missed opportunities that we had especially towards the end of the game,” Kemp said. “Not missed opportunities than making a shot but missed opportunities as in playing as a team and coming out with a team victory.”
“I wish we had learned from that sooner rather than taking the course of a season and an offseason, but looking back at that game specifically, it was so much more than a play here. It was definitely it was kind of like a highlight of us whether we are going to move forward as a team and come out of those type of games with victories or not and lose games like that if we don’t play as a team.”
With under two minutes left Lewis, who averaged 14.4 points per game as a freshman, missed a jumper with a chance to tie the game and in frustration drew a technical foul as he headed back on defense. Anthony Jackson’s two free throws helped seal the game for Stony Brook.
“I think mentally we weren’t tough enough to finish plays,” Lewis said. “We weren’t tough enough to execute plays and we weren’t mentally tough enough to close the game out.”
“That was a big game for me, a big learning experience for me because I know in the beginning of the game they mentally got me out of the game. That was a stepping stone for me that I have to be mentally stronger and mentally locked in.”
Lewis returns to Long Island where he played at St. Mary’s high school in Manhasset, where he averaged 23.9 points per game and led his team to a 29-1 record in his senior season.
Bowie, who led the Red Foxes with 16 points and grabbed seven rebounds in the opener, said the loss against the Seawolves epitomized the season of struggles Marist had.
“We at first had some good moments and had some bad moments where our offense was really good and our defense was really tight,” Bowie said. “Then we had moments where we tried to play one-on-one basketball and our defense was lacking. I will probably look at the tape before the game, so if we just see what we did wrong and see what we did well, we just capitalize on the good moments and minimize the bad moments, we should do well in the opener.”
Ryan Restivo covers the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference for Big Apple Buckets. You can follow Ryan on Twitter @ryanarestivo or contact Ryan at rrestivo[at]nycbuckets.com.
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