Copyright Hartford Courant
Central Connecticut’s men arrived in Chestnut Hill unfazed, if not unaware of the history stacked against them. This was supposed to be another of those guarantee games, in which a mid-major travels to a higher level of basketball, gets a pay day, gets a taste of power conference competition, takes it on the chin and gets back on the bus to real life. The Blue Devils didn’t get the memo, didn’t go to Boston College to be feel-good fodder for the Eagles. “We had that confidence going into the game,” sophomore forward Darin Smith Jr. said. “Our coaches made it very clear, our team made it very clear, we watched film on them, practiced together every day and right at jump ball, we knew what type of game it was going to be.” If UConn beating ACC teams in football seemed improbable until recently, Central pulling off such a win in basketball would have seemed unfathomable … until now. Smith’s late layup pushes Central Connecticut past Boston College 60-59 Central hung around, gave itself a chance, and Smith took advantage of a spread defense to drive the lane and score the winning basket with 3.2 seconds left. When Boston College’s last shot hit iron, the Blue Devils could return to campus with a 60-59 victory Tuesday night — the program’s first-ever win over a power conference school. Here’s what we got: CCSU, which moved up to Division I in 1986, is 0-19 against teams currently in the Big Ten, 0-10 against the Big 12, 0-2 against the SEC, 0-2 against former Pac-12 teams and was 0-12 against the ACC. So now they are 1-45 against the power conferences. The Blue Devils’ win over Providence in 1999 is the only win in 32 tries against the Big East. None of that, mind you, is surprising or unexpected. But where sports teams throw around the word “historic” a lot lately, what happened Tuesday obviously checks all the boxes in that category. “These guys know me, I’m pretty even keel,” coach Patrick Sellers said. “It could be a win over Boston College or a win over Vermont State Johnson, if we’re playing good basketball, I’m excited about playing good basketball. This week, we had three really good days of practice, we were really elite in practice and it carried over to the game. We’re happy we got a big win, now we’re back to zero.” Well, you don’t go from hero to zero that quickly. Central (2-1), which opened its season with a win over aforementioned D-III Vermont State Johnson, then lost 71-49 at Quinnipiac last week, has a chance for another good get vs. UMass on Sunday. The Blue Devils, who typically get $80-$90,000 to make a trip like this, cannot offer a whole lot in name-image-likeness money, and opted out of revenue sharing. What they can offer recruits is what they saw on the ACC Network Tuesday night. “Smitty could tell you, and I say this to recruits, part of the recruiting process, I say, ‘fellas, we don’t have NIL money, we don’t fly in a private jet, we don’t do this, don’t do that,'” Sellers said. “All we have is really good people, really good character guys. He has really good people around him and we play a fun style of basketball on the offensive end and the defensive end.” This is Sellers’ fifth season at Central, his alma mater, which gave him the long overdue chance to be a head coach, and he has more than made due with his resources. The Devils were 45-18 the past two seasons, winning or sharing the NEC regular-season title both years, but losing deep in the conference tournament. Never mind Christmas, March Madness arrived early in New Britain this season, giving the Devils something to call upon if they should find themselves fighting for an automatic NCAA bid four months from now. “In March, we’ve got to play like it’s any other game,” Smith said. Dom Amore: Patrick Sellers, Blue Devils bring the Madness back to March in New Britain Central has 10 new players, including Melo Sanchez, a transfer from Arkansas who scored 17 at BC, as Sellers continues to skillfully work the portal, finding impact players at the D-II level. Smith, a 6 foot 7 wing from Springfield, arrived at his moment via the old fashioned route. Committing from Vermont Academy, he redshirted his first year as a veteran Central team helped get him ready for his moment. Last season, he played 18 minutes per game, showing flashes, and was named to the conference’s all-rookie team. Now he is starting and has 44 points in the Blue Devils’ first three games, including 14 at BC, where he was 6-for-13 from the floor and had five rebounds. After the loss at Quinnipiac, Sellers and his staff ripped up their practice plan and took a different approach, running more scrimmages in the three sessions leading up to Boston College. It sharpened the defense, and sped up the offense for an anticipated faster pace. Hang around until the last media timeout, with four minutes to go, then go get it down the stretch. The Devils trailed by as much as 11, but took the lead, 55-54, after making seven shots in a row. Sophomore guard James Jones gave CCSU a 58-56 lead on a jumper with 3 minutes to go, his only basket of the game. Sellers had preserved all his timeouts, and was able to manage the action down the stretch. After converting a three-point play, BC, now up one, missed a three with 13 seconds left, and Max Frazier rebounded for Central. Sellers called time, and re-inserted experienced point guard Jay Rogers. Dom Amore’s Sunday Read: Here is Emeka Okafor’s second act; UConn stars help Jamaica recovery, more “We went into the timeout and I said, ‘this is what we play basketball for,'” Smith said. “It was an exciting moment, and they drew up the play, it was a great play. We had a shooter in the corner who came off the screen, that gave me a window. I had a wide-open lane and my eyes lit up. I made the basket.” The Eagles (1-2) couldn’t score in the remaining 3.2. As the clock ran out, Smith’s teammates all ran over and whacked him in the chest. “When you win a game like that on the ACC Network or wherever, people get a chance to see it,” Sellers said, “they get to know what we’re talking about, they get to know our players and see that we have good people, we have really good character guys, that’s the big thing for us. People see how we play, how they share the ball, how they rally around each other, the no-quit mentality. They can feel that, they can feel it through the TV.”
