Moon Township, Pa. - College basketball fans just might want to drop into the Charles L. Sewall Center Saturday night because they could witness Division I history if Robert Morris University coach Andrew Toole's possible scenario plays out.
The key figures in this scenario are Central Connecticut State guards Kyle Vinales and Matt Hunter.
"They might get 60 (points) apiece,'' Toole suggested.
If that happens, Vinales and Hunter would break a record that's stood for 22 years to THE DAY.
On Jan. 5, 1991, U.S. International's Kevin Bradshaw (72 points) and Isaac Brown (20) combined for 92 points in the Gulls' 186-150 loss to Loyola Marymount. That's the record for most points scored by two teammates in a Division I game.
Now, it's a bit unlikely Vinales and Hunter will break that record Saturday night. Probably they won't even approach the mark.
Understand that Toole made his "they might get 60 apiece'' comment in the immediate wake of a woeful defensive performance by the Colonials against Bryant guards Dyami Starks and Frankie Dobbs Thursday night in the Bulldogs' 84-77 victory against RMU in a Northeast Conference opener at the Sewall Center.
Starks, with a career-high 29 points, and Dobbs, who scored a career-high 26, combined to score 55 points, helped by combined 12-for-20 accuracy from beyond the arc.
How were those two able to shoot that well from deep?
"They walked into wide open three's without hands in their faces,'' Toole said. "What are they going to do - pass them up?''
Without question, Toole thought his team's "defense'' was disgusting. And that left him dismayed.
"We practice defense a lot,'' he said. "You wouldn't know it by tonight.''
Starks' performance, the sophomore transfer from Columbia was 7-for-12 from international waters, was particularly galling to Toole. He noted that entering the game Starks this season had taken 53 percent of his shots from three-point range.
"It's what he does,'' Toole said. "It's what our (scouting report) shows him doing over and over and over. It was like we decided, 'We're just going to gamble and hope he misses tonight.' That's not a real smart way to try and be successful.''
It wasn't just Starks who stymied the Colonials, and that's another thing that irritated Toole, who cited Dobbs and inside presence Alex Francis (18 points) as additional contributors to his angst.
"They have three guys who combined average 45 of their 66 (points). Tonight, those guys killed us,'' Toole said. "Twenty-nine, 26 and 18. I was a (political science) major. I wasn't in the Wharton School (at Penn), so I don't know math, but that's a lot of points. It's a lot of points. It says on our scouting report - 'Contain Francis and Starks. They average 32 of their 66.' And if you throw Dobbs in - he's (averaging) 13 points a game - that's 45 of their 66. That's almost 70 percent of their offense coming from those three guys. And we let those three guys single-handedly beat us. That's just not caring. That's not buying in.
"It's hard to be very pleasant about that effort, that's for sure. I think you have to give Bryant a lot of credit. They played a terrific game, and we played a poor game. But they certainly beat us. Their best players made great plays and made great shots, and our better players did not convey to their teammates how important defense is to our program. We're not winning any game in the 80s.''
Toole was concerned from the outset about how his team would start the game after having not played since Dec. 20 at Arkansas and about whether his team would overlook Bryant, which last season was 2-28 overall and 1-17 in the NEC.
"That's where you hope you have veteran guys who are kind of relaying that information to their teammates about how important it is to prepare yourself, how important it is to defend,'' Toole said. "It takes no talent to go out and play as hard as you possibly can, and we did not do that tonight. Obviously there was some rust early (and) we had some of our more reliable guys really make some poor decisions tonight.''
One would think that the Colonials, who played in each of the four previous NEC Tournament championship games and who went 8-5 in their nonconference schedule this season, would have been a tad more focused for their conference opener.
Was Toole surprised that they weren't?
"No, unfortunately,'' he said after a lengthy pause while considering his response. "I'm not surprised because I've seen it at practice too often. Some of the guys who are supposed to be leading us, supposed to be setting the tone and providing an example for the way we've played basketball at Robert Morris for the past six years are not doing that. We have some good players and we have some guys who can make some shots and we've won some games, but certainly our mentality in terms of defense and attention to detail defensively and holding each other accountable is really far out of whack.
"It's not as if the message from the coaching staff has been any different. Maybe we need to find another way to get it across -- be creative in our thinking about the way we can convey the message to our team -- but unfortunately, like a lot of things, until you get tired of it as an individual your behavior usually doesn't change. We have some guys that I just scratch my head at. It's like the definition of insanity - continuing to do the same thing and expecting a different result. We have some of that going on.''
Another reason Toole wasn't totally surprised by his team's performance against Bryant is that he's seen this happen before in the previous couple of seasons.
"All too often unfortunately,'' he said. "I've told our team since the Arkansas game (that) the greatest strides we can possibly make are mental. What are we going to do? Are we going to get in better shape?
Are we going to all of a sudden improve some certain skill level in the next eight weeks of the season?
No. It's a mental focus. It's a sustained effort. It's mental consistency. It's understanding that it's important to do things a certain way if you're going to be successful. We try to skirt that as much as we can. We constantly make the same mistake over and over and over.
"We quiz our guys on the scouting report. Inevitably we're going to get to somebody who doesn't know their scouting report. It's just taking individual accountability for the decisions you make. I'm sure if you ask them, nobody was at fault for tonight's game. It was the guy next to them or the other guy didn't rotate or the ref was mean or the other team actually wanted to win the game. Could you believe that? (Bryant) actually wanted to win? Wow!''
The Colonials were in this game at times. They led, 38-36, briefly early in the second half. They rallied from a 51-41 deficit to tie the game at 51 with 8:31 remaining. They surged from trailing, 71-60, with 1:58 left to get to within three points, 80-77, with just 20 seconds remaining.
But they just couldn't get over the hump.
"We kept taking breaks,'' Anthony Myers-Pate said.
And in the end, Bryant had improved to 8-4 and held a share of the NEC lead for the first time in its Division I history.
"What I was thinking about at the end of the game was that two years ago when we played here the final score was 91-38,'' Bryant coach Tim O'Shea told the Providence Journal. "From that perspective, it really is satisfying to see just how far we've come in two years.''
"Every year is a new year,'' RMU guard Lucky Jones said. "I guess they just want some respect. They played harder. They played tougher. And they got the win.''
Velton Jones led RMU with 24 points - getting 12 of those in the final 1:32. Lucky Jones and Karvel Anderson each scored 13 points, Anderson getting all of his following halftime and after he took the wrap off his sore right (shooting) wrist.
Was his wrist a problem?
"I got through it,'' Anderson said.
Mike McFadden added 11 points but none after intermission.
NEXT UP: Central Connecticut State lost its opener at Saint Francis University, 67-60, which extended the Blue Devils' losing streak to five games. Vinales (23) and Hunter (18) combined for 41 points. The top two scorers in the NEC were a combined 13-for-37 from the field.
The Red Flash got their first win of the season after 11 losses and received a spectacular effort from 6'6" sophomore Earl Brown, who scored 16 points and grabbed a nearly-historic 25 rebounds. The NEC record for most rebounds in a game is 26, set by Long Island's Carey Scurry against Marist Feb. 2, 1983. Brown's 25 rebounds are the most in a Division I game since Dec. 22, 2009 when Morgan State's Kevin Thompson also had 25 against Towson.
"(Brown) should be (NEC) Player of the Week even if he doesn't get another point or another rebound Saturday (against Bryant),'' CCSU coach Howie Dickenman told the Altoona Mirror. "It's about tenacity and wanting rebounds. He thought every missed shot was his. His name was on the ball. The kid was a monster.''
NEC NUGGETS: Wagner beat visiting Monmouth, 60-56, Thursday. The Seahawks played without star guard Latif Rivers, who served a one-game suspension imposed by the NEC stemming from an incident at the end of Wagner's game against Robert Morris in the semifinals of last season's NEC Tournament. Wagner is 31-1 over its past 32 games when it holds a lead with five minutes left ... Defending NEC champion LIU Brooklyn lost its opener at Sacred Heart, 77-73. The Blackbirds played without standout Julian Boyd, who's out for the season because of a knee injury, and Jamal Olasewere, C.J. Garner and Troy Joseph, who were suspended for the first two NEC games because of an incident in September that also involved Boyd. Louis Montes scored a career-high 35 points for Sacred Heart, hitting 13-of-17 from the field ... Fairleigh Dickinson won, 72-65, at Mount St. Mary's, which didn't help itself by making only four of 28 three-point attempts and sinking just one of five from the free throw line ... St. Francis (N.Y.) won at Quinnipiac, 63-61. Quinnipiac also struggled from the free throw line, making only 11-of-26 attempts.
