By Zolan Kanno-Youngs, News Staff
Junior Demetrius Pollard and Northeastern basketball coach Bill Coen had a one-on-one conversation the day before Sunday’s homecoming game against Central Connecticut State University in Cabot Gym.
The guard’s playing time had been sporadic and Northeastern, as a team, had been shooting a mere 30 percent from behind the arc in the first two games of the season. Coen stressed in the meeting that the Virginia Beach native needed to be more aggressive.
Pollard answered the call, shooting a lights-out eight of 12 from behind the arc and three out of four from the line for 27 points in the Husky’s 83-69 win over CCSU. The eight three-pointers tied the school record for made three-pointers in a game previously set by Marcus Barnes.
“We had been struggling to shoot the ball from three and [Pollard] is a big weapon in that regard so we need him to be aggressive and to be opportunistic,” Coen said.
Sophomore forward Zach Stahl followed Pollard in scoring with 15 points with five rebounds while sophomore point-guard David Walker had another solid game with 14 points, six assists, five rebounds, four steals and three blocks. Junior forward Quincy Ford did not dress for the game beacuse of back problems.
Playing without their leading scorer, sophomore guard Kyle Vinales (26 points per game), CCSU was led by freshmen Khalen Cumberlander (20 points) and Terrell Allen (11 points).
Pollard put the Huskies up early, hitting five of his eight three-pointers in the first seven minutes of the game. As a team, Northeastern hit 53 percent of their shots in the first half.
However, CCSU kept the game competitive with a 7-2 run to close the half, capped off by a buzzer beating three-pointer from junior guard De’Angelo Speech.
CCSU just couldn’t seem to get the picture as Pollard opened Northeastern’s second-half scoring with two more three-pointers.
“Demetrius set the tone coming out of the gate,” Coen said. “He kind of gave everyone the confidence that we needed.”
The most electric moments of the game came just under the seven-minute mark. After Pollard made it a 69-56 lead with his record-tying eighth three-pointer, Walker showed his much anticipated athletic ability with a posterizing right-
handed slam over CCSU guard Malcolm McMillan.
“Dave, he’s the most athletic on the team and we always tell him, ‘Dave, if you going to the rim, just dunk it!” Pollard said. “He’s always so high and this time he actually put his head down, went up and dunked it. It was exciting.”
Just as McMillan couldn’t reach Walker’s arm, CCSU never managed to catch the Huskies.
After Northeastern’s frontcourt carried the load against Stony Brook, the 41 combined points from Walker and Pollard in the backcourt was much to the delight of Coen.
“There’s a lot of pride in our backcourt and they know we need to balance inside scoring and outside scoring as we showed we can,” Coen said.
The Huskies next play against Georgetown University in the first round of the Puerto Rico Tip-off today at 12:30 pm.
