FAIRFAX, Va. — The Stony Brook men's basketball team was not able to get the offense rolling on Tuesday night, falling in its season opener at George Mason at the EagleBank Arena.
The Seawolves' opening bucket came from one of its highly touted transfer guards, as
Jahlil Jenkins hit a floater in the lane to make it 2-0 less than a minute in. The Ranson W. Va., native had five of the first seven and eight of the first 12 for the visitors.
George Mason expanded the advantage as high as 10 in the opening 20 minutes, but Stony Brook was able to respond, scoring four of the final five points of the period to go in down 35-28.
Anthony Roberts was the one who got it going in the second half, scoring seven of the Seawolves' first eight in the stanza, helping Stony Brook keep pace with its Atlantic 10 foe as it was able to get it as close as seven with 11:50 to go before George Mason pulled away.
STATS AND NOTES
- Both in their Seawolves debuts, Jenkins and Roberts were the two leaders in the scoring department with 13 and 10, respectively.
- Kaine Roberts, Payton Shumpert and Tanahj Pettway also saw their first action in a Stony Brook uniform.
- Mo Diallo finished the night with two steals, one off his career high. Elijah Olaniyi also had a pair of takeaways and Jenkins led all Seawolves players with three.
- Tykei Greene picked up where he left off on the glass, leading the squad with six boards. He paced the team in that department seven times last season.
QUOTES FROM THE SEAWOLVES
"It was good to get the year started. We have a lot of new guys and it's going to take some time to build some chemistry. We had 11 guys miss over a week of preseason and that showed with our sense of timing and purpose on offense. They did a great job moving their feet and we had a hard time getting past the primary defender much of the night. We definitely need the practice time, as we just aren't very good right now. Luckily, we'll get that heading into our Kansas game. I like our group and we will continue to get better." - head coach
Geno Ford.
UP NEXT
The Seawolves head to Lawrence, Kan., on November 18, taking on number three Kansas at 8:00 p.m. The game is being streamed live on ESPN Plus.
Seawolves fans are encouraged to join us at Village Idiot Pub in Lake Grove for a watch party beginning at 7:30 p.m. More information will be released in the coming days.
For an inside look at the Stony Brook men's basketball program, be sure to follow them on
Facebook,
Twitter and
Instagram.
