Maine Up Next on Wednesday Night for Dartmouth

Wednesday, December 11

Bangor, Maine / Cross Insurance Center

7:00 PM

Dartmouth College

Maine

Wes Slajchert men's basketball action versus Thomas College

Sophomore Wes Slajchert

Photo by: © Brian Foley for Dartmouth Ath

Maine Up Next on Wednesday Night for Dartmouth

12/11/2019 10:44:00 AM | Men's Basketball

Cross Insurance Center ESPN+Live Stats Twitter Updates Dartmouth Notes Maine Notes

The Big Green look to end a three-game skid

By: Rick Bender

DARTMOUTH (5-4)
at MAINE (3-6)
Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2019 | 7 PM | ESPN+
Cross Insurance Center (8,000) | Bangor, Maine

• Dartmouth is looking to end a three-game skid — all on the road — when it takes the court at Maine on Wednesday night.
• Last time out, the Big Green played South Florida tight in the first half before the Bulls scored 25 of the first 31 points in the second stanza to defeat Dartmouth, 63-44.
• Three players led the Green with eight points, ending a streak of 241 consecutive games with at least one player reaching double figures.
• James Foye has been on target during the first three games of his five-game road swing. The senior has hit 12-of-22 from distance (.545) while leading the team at 14.7 ppg in this stretch.
• Both Chris Knight and Aaryn Rai have been efficient shooting the ball as well, each at 61.5 percent (16-of-26) with Rai nearly perfect inside the arc at 12-of-14.
• Foye has also made good decisions with the ball, dishing out 11 assists without a turnover.
• For the season, Knight leads the team in scoring (12.4 ppg) while Rai has been the top rebounder (6.3 rpg).
• Dartmouth has struggled at the line as a team this season (63.4 percent) but converted 8-of-10 free throws the last time out at South Florida.

Series vs. Maine
• Dartmouth leads the overall series, 14-11, winning six of the seven meetings since restarting the series in 2012, including a 78-52 blowout victory in Hanover just over a year ago.
• Brendan Barry led all players with 18 points while Chris Knight posted a double-double with 17 points and 12 boards.
• The Big Green are 6-4 against Maine within the state borders with victories in each of the last four trips here dating back to the 2003-04 season.
• The Big Green are 123-113 all-time against current America East schools, including a win over UMass Lowell last month.

Scouting the Black Bears
• Maine has established a pattern of winning one before losing three. Good news for Big Green fans is that the Black Bears ended a three-game slide on Saturday at Central Connecticut, 66-64.
• The bad news for Dartmouth fans is that Maine has not lost at home this year. Granted, it is just one game against Merrimack (84-64).
• The Black Bears play at a slow pace, averaging just 58.9 points a night while allowing only 64.0.
• The team has more than an international flair to it with 12 of the 15 players from outside the U.S.
• Forward Andrew Fleming is the leading scorer at 18.4 ppg while shooting 54.3 percent.
• The other Black Bear averaging in double figures is Sergio El Darwich at 11.3 ppg, though he has missed the last three games.
• On the glass, Nedeljko Prijovic grabs 6.7 rebounds a night, and Fleming nearly matches him at 6.4 per game.
• While 3-point shooting has been a problem for Maine at 29.1 percent this year, the team has been just as good at guarding the perimeter with opponents shooting 29.1 percent as well.
• The Black Bears have had problems with turnovers at 17.0 per game while forcing just 10.7.
• Richard Barron (Kenyon '91) is in his second year guiding the men's team after coaching the Black Bear women from 2011-17. With the men, his record entering tonight is 8-33 after going 85-89 with the women and is 240-261 in 19 seasons as a men's and women's head coach, including a six-year stint guiding the Princeton women.

Streaks End at South Florida
Dartmouth had hit at least 11 3-pointers in four straight games for just the third time in program history entering the game at South Florida on Dec. 6. But the Bulls brought that streak to an end, holding the Big Green to just six. In addition, Dartmouth had played 241 consecutive games with at least one player scoring 10 or more points, but that also ended as three Big Green — Chris Knight, Aaryn Rai and Ian Sistare — led the team with eight points apiece.

Foye at 50 Percent
You won't find him listed among the nation's leaders in 3-point percentage, but James Foye has been one of the most accurate long-distance shooters in the country at an even 50 percent, a figure achieved by only 12 qualified shooters. How does one qualify? Well, you have to make at least 2.5 threes per game played, and Foye is "only" at 2.44. For his career, Foye is at 40.4 percent (84-of-208), which ranks fourth all-time at Dartmouth.

Rai and Shine
In the first nine games, Aaryn Rai has hit at least half of his field goal attempts in seven of them, including the last four during which he is shooting 61.3 percent (19-of-31). For the season, the junior forward is shooting 57.4 percent, a figure that would rank sixth among the single-season record holders at Dartmouth.

Free Throws Hardly Free
For some reason, neither Dartmouth nor its opponents have had much success at the charity stripe this season. The Big Green did manage to convert a season-best 80 percent (8-of-10) at the line at South Florida, which raised their season percentage to 63.4. That would be the third lowest mark for the team in any season since the stat was recorded in 1964-65. Opponents, however, are having an even worse time at a woeful 54.5 percent, which I will say is the worst mark in Division I without actually looking it up because it would take a really long time to go through every team to find it since the NCAA doesn't keep track of opponent free throw percentage.