This season, outstanding performances have become the norm – sophomore Justin Wright-Foreman had two monster slam dunks. He ended the game with 25 points, five rebounds and two assists as he led the Pride to a 74-64 win over the Northeastern Huskies in Boston on Saturday night.
Wright-Foreman has now scored 20 or more points in his last seven games. This win gives Hofstra a season sweep over the Huskies.
To begin, the game was off to a very slow start; both teams struggled to score early on. Hofstra began the game with a score of 1-9 from the field. After Eli Pemberton hit a three to bring the Pride within one at 11-10, the lead kept changing back and forth as there were no major runs throughout the game.
Of course, that only lasted until the very last two minutes, when Hofstra pulled away to ultimately win by 10.
What sparked this run to end the game was a major one-handed dunk by Wright-Foreman, followed by, in the ensuing Pride possession, a three-pointer from Pemberton. This gave them the comfortable lead of 68-60.
Another bright spot for the Pride during this game was the return of center Rokas Gustys, who had missed play-time since Jan. 26 due to injury.
Gustys, who is nearly averaging a double-double for the season (8.5 points per game and 12 rebounds), ended the night with only two points, but grabbed 12 rebounds in 24 minutes of play.
Brian Bernardi, who led the team with 40 minutes of play, was second in scoring in the match with 17 points.
Deron Powers, who only scored eight points, had a fairly quiet game, but he made six of seven free throws – some of which came in clutch late in the second half helping his team to ice the game.
Hofstra led Northeastern in nearly every statistic: field goal percentage, free throw percentage, rebounds and assists, amongst others.
Perhaps the most notable stat of the game was the three-point field goal percentages scored by both teams.
Hofstra ended with a superb 53 percent of three-point attempts made, whereas Northeastern ended with only 22 percent made.
With this win over the Huskies, the Pride is now 13-14 overall and 5-9 within the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) .
After ending their road trip with a loss at Towson and a win at Northeastern, Hofstra heads back home to the Mack for two tough matchups. On Feb. 16, Hofstra will host the College of Charleston, the number two team in the CAA and Feb. 18 they will host the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, the number one team in the conference.
