Northeastern falls to Stony Brook in CAA opener, 62-53
After a taxing nonleague slate, the Northeastern Huskies opened the CAA play with a hard scrabble 62-53 loss to Stony Brook on Thursday night at Matthews Arena.
The Huskies fell to 5-9 overall, 0-1 in the league and 13-6 in CAA openers. NU will resume conference play on Saturday night at Monmouth. The Seawolves improved to 8-6 and 1-0.
Northeastern shot 33.3% from the floor and a dismal 4-of-18 from behind the arc. Graduate forward Chris Doherty notched a double double with 15 points and 12 rebounds while sophomore guard Masai Troutman netted 16.
Stony Brook shot 37.5% from the floor with five treys, 41 boards and seven assists. Guard Tyler Stephenson-Moore led the Seawolves with 21 points.
“I thought we started the game pretty good, got off to a good start and got the lead, but as the game wore on, we kind of sputtered,” said NU head coach
Bill Coen. “It was more our offense that let us down.”
Coen, the longest tenured head coach in the conference, had his push for the CAA combined regular season and tournament career wins record temporarily put on hold. Coen has 181 league wins, two shy of the record set by Jim Larranaga at George Mason from 1998-2011.
Coen has won 275 games since taking over the program on Huntington Avenue in 2006, well beyond the old record of 250 set by Jim Calhoun from 197286. The Huskies have been to the CAA title game a league-best five times with two conference championships on Coen’s watch.
“It’s hard to win one in this league,” said Coen. “There are a lot of really good coaches in this league and good players and night in and night out you have to compete.
“I thought we competed tonight but it was more our execution. We will get back on the floor and regroup and get ready for Monmouth.”
With the game tied 4-4, NU went on an 11-2 run fueled by the Huskies’ dominance on the defensive glass. Troutman got the Huskies rolling on a follow and Harold Woods put NU up 15-6, compelling Stony Brook coach Geno Ford to burn a timeout. The Seawolves regrouped and ripped off six straight to make it 15-12 into the third media timeout.
Troutman scored six straight to give the Huskies a 21-14 lead with 2:25 to play. The Seawolves outscored NU 10-2 down the stretch to take a 24-23 lead into the half.
“You could see they were gaining momentum and establishing their identity,” said Coen. “They have really good guards in a fourguard rotation with their style of play. They took away our two-point game and forced us into a threepoint game.”
Stony Brook opened the second half with a flurry and took a 37-31 lead on a layup and a free throw by forward Chris Maidoh with 13:46 to play. The Seawolves extended the run and took a 42-34 lead on Stephenson-Moore’s second trey with 12:39 to play. The Seawolves led by 14 with 8:13 to play.