Searching for First Win of 2015-16 at Marist on Tuesday

DARTMOUTH (0-1) at
MARIST (0-1)
McCANN ARENA, POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y.
TUESDAY, NOV. 17, 2015 • 7 P.M.
Video: Ivy League Digital Network (courtesy Red Fox Network)
Audio: Red Fox Network — Ed Weir (play-by-play), Steve Eggink (analyst)
All-Time Series: Tied 2-2
Last Meeting: Nov. 17, 2000 — Marist 68, Dartmouth 54

Final Test Before Finals
•   Following a season-opening 84-67 loss at Seton Hall on Friday, Dartmouth travels to Marist on Tuesday night as both teams search for their first win of 2015-16.
•   This game comes on the eve of fall finals at the college, which divides up its academic calendar into quarters instead of semesters.
•   Freshman Evan Boudreaux did not disappoint in his collegiate debut, scoring 25 points to go with six rebounds and three steals to earn Ivy League Rookie of the Week honors.
•   Boudreaux's 25 points are the most by any Big Green freshman in his collegiate debut, and the most by a Dartmouth freshman in any game since February of 2013.
•   Senior Connor Boehm quietly had a productive offensive night against the Pirates, knocking down 7-of-12 field goals, including both three-point attempts, to complement Boudreaux with 16 points.
•   Defensively, Dartmouth was whistled for its most fouls (32) in almost exactly seven years when it committed 33 at Providence on Nov. 18, 2008. Yet not a single player fouled out.
•   In addition, Seton Hall's field goal percentage (.617) was the first time an opponent topped 60 percent since Harvard shot 65.9 percent on Jan. 26, 2014.
•   But the Big Green were able to force 20 Pirate turnovers, a total topped just once in each of the past three seasons.

Series vs. Marist
•   These two teams have met just four times on the hardwood, all in tournaments hosted by the Red Foxes.
•   The four games have been split down the middle with Dartmouth's two victories sandwiched between Marist's two.
• The last meeting was won by the Red Foxes, 68-54, in the season opener of the 2000-01 season on this very date.
•   Dartmouth is 19-31 all-time against current MAAC schools.
•   Head coach Paul Cormier is 4-5 against Marist in his career with all nine games coming during his tenure at Fairfield.

Scouting the Red Foxes
•   Marist suffered a hard-fought 67-64 defeat at home against Holy Cross last Friday to open the 2015-16 season.
•   The Red Foxes, 7-25 a year ago while going 5-15 in the MAAC, was picked to finish eighth in the 11-team league this year.
•   Nearly half of the roster consists of freshmen, three of which started the season opener, combining for 28 points and 14 rebounds.
•   Khallid Hart paced Marist in the loss with 21 points while converting 9-of-10 free throws but missing all six three-point attempts.
•   Freshman Kristinn Palsson was 4-of-8 on three-pointers, but the rest of the team went 0-for-16.
•   Senior center Eric Truog at 6-10 and 240 pounds is a load in the post, helping him grab 12 rebounds against Holy Cross as the Red Foxes hauled in 37 compared to 32 for the Crusaders.
•   A familiar face graces the bench for Marist with former Dartmouth assistant Mike Maker (California Baptist '88) in his second season as the head coach with a 7-26 record. Maker spent 11 seasons with the Big Green, but his most recent job was as the head coach at Williams College where he went 147-32 in six seasons.

Boudreaux Boudreaux Golly!
Highly touted freshman Evan Boudreaux did not disappoint in his collegiate debut, collecting 25 points, six rebounds and three steals at Seton Hall during the 84-67 defeat. Since freshman eligibility came into play in 1978, no Big Green rookie had ever scored as many points in the season opener. For his work, the Ivy League recognized him as its Rookie of the Week.

Dropping a Quarter
Dimes are for point guards, such as Malik Gill who handed out seven assists at Seton Hall in the season opener. But quarters are for scorers as Evan Boudreaux had the most points (25) by a freshman in any game since Alex Mitola dropped 27 against Yale in his rookie campaign in the 2012-13 season. Over the last 40 season opener, the most points by any Dartmouth player is 35 — Jim Barton against Hartford in 1986-87 and Sea Lonergan versus Colgate in 1996-97.

Whistle While You Work
The Dartmouth defense struggled a bit against Seton Hall in the season opener as the Pirates shot 61.7 percent from the floor. As it turned out, the Big Green's best defense came by fouling the Big East school — 32 times to be exact — that led to 43 Pirate free throws. But Seton Hall barely converted half of those freebies (22 to be exact). The only other time in the last 10 years Dartmouth fouled a team as much was against Providence (33) nearly seven years prior to the day, Nov. 18, 2008.

Year 3 of Ivy League Digital Network
All home games and every Ivy League contest — a total of 22 games — will be streamed live in high-definition this season through the Big Green Insider channel on the Ivy League Digital Network. Visit DartmouthSports.com, the official website of Dartmouth athletics, for information on how to subscribe and watch the action on your computer, tablet or phone.

Preseason Poll
Just as they were last year, the Big Green were pegged to finish sixth in the preseason media poll. Harvard, which has earned the Ivy League's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament each of the past four seasons, tumbled to fourth with heavy losses to graduation and injury. The team picked to win, Yale, received just five of the 17 first-place votes, while the next two teams — Columbia and Princeton — each had six. Dartmouth bested its prediction by two places in the final standings; how high can the Green go this year?

Postseason Berth
Last season, for the first time in 56 years, Dartmouth played a postseason basketball game. While it wasn't in the NCAA Tournament, the Big Green did get a taste of postseason action with their game at Canisius in the CollegeInsider.com Tournament (CIT). Dartmouth fell to the Golden Griffins, 87-72, but the Green ended one of the longest postseason droughts in the NCAA. And it only took winning their last five Ivy games to qualify for the postseason with .500 records in the league (7-7) and overall (14-14).

Ivy League Rookie of the Year
Miles Wright joined an elite group of players when he was announced as the Ivy League Rookie of the Year in 2014-15. Only seven other Big Green players have ever earned the honor (three when it was Sophomore of the Year before freshman eligibility) — Bill Raynor (1972), Adam Sutton ('74), Larry Cubas ('75), Bryan Randall ('85), Jim Barton ('86), Sea Lonergan ('94) and Leon Pattman (2004).

Wright averaged 7.7 points and 2.9 rebounds a game while ranking among the league leaders in steals with 42. He raised his profile in the middle of the Ivy season when he scored in double figures for six straight games, averaging 17.0 points and 4.2 rebounds while shooting 57.8 percent (37-of-64) with 12 three-pointers, earning the Ivy League Rookie of the Week award in back-to-back weeks.

Man of Steal
In each of the three years Malik Gill has played thus far, he has led the team in steals, despite ranking anywhere from sixth to ninth on the team in minutes played. He finished second in the Ivy League as a freshman with 50 steals, a total topped by only four players in Dartmouth history, including Kenny Mitchell '97 twice. As a sophomore he once again led the team with 32. He was nearly beaten out last year by Miles Wright, who had 42 thefts, but Gill one-upped him with 43. For his career, he ranks ninth on the Big Green all-time leaders with 127 swipes, and has stolen the ball exactly once for every 10 minutes on the court.

1,000 Points on the Horizon
Senior Connor Boehm is still a ways off from becoming the 28th player in Dartmouth history to score 1,000 points in a career as he needs 169 to reach the milestone. He is also the seventh most accurate shooter ever at Dartmouth with his field goal percentage of .508. Only seven Big Green players have finished a career hitting at least half of their shots, and Boehm has the chance to become the eighth.

Schedules