BULLDOGS PUT WINNING STREAK ON THE LINE, HOST FDU THURSDAY NIGHT (7 P.M.)

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SMITHFIELD, R.I. – The Bryant University men's basketball team returns to the court to put its first winning streak of the season on the line Thursday night against Northeast Conference opponent Fairleigh Dickinson. The Bulldogs look to win their fourth-straight contest and improve to 4-3 in league play when the teams tip off from the Chace Athletic Center at 7:00 p.m.

THE SERIES
The Knights and the Bulldogs have faced off four times in their history, all four meetings coming since the 2008-09 season. FDU holds a 3-1 edge in the all-time series after sweeping Bryant in a two-game set last year with a pair of January wins (60-55 at Stratis Arena in New Jersey, 67-55 at the Chace Athletic Center in Rhode Island) and topping the Black and Gold, 78-68, earlier this season in the NEC opener. Bryant earned its only win over the Knights in the first-ever meeting between the programs on Jan. 17, 2009, when the Bulldogs took a 56-43 victory at home during Bryant's inaugural Division I season.

SCOUTING THE KNIGHTS
FDU put an end to a nine-game losing skid its last time out, topping Houston Baptist, 75-64, at home and are 2-4 in league play with a 4-12 overall mark.  Only five players have appeared in all 16 games for the Knights and just two — leading scorer and preseason all-conference selection Mike Scott (15.9 ppg, 6.1 rpg) and top rebounder Kamil Svrdlik (12.0 ppg, 7.3 rpg, team-high 26 blocks) — have earned 16 starts this season. Terence Grier joins the pair in double-digit scoring average (11.5 ppg), while Scott paces the FDU side with 76 assists and 31 steals while averaging 37.8 minutes per outing. The team shoots just 39.1 percent from the floor as a unit but takes a slight rebounding edge, 37.8-37.1. FDU scores 63.5 points per contest but has allowed opponents to average 72.4 points per game as well.

LAST TIME AGAINST THE KNIGHTS
Senior Cecil Gresham poured in a game-high and season-best 28 points, but the Bulldogs allowed FDU to shoot an impressive 54 percent from the floor in the 2010-11 Northeast Conference opener as the Knights took a 78-68 win at Stratis Arena in Hackensack, N.J. Bryant pulled within a single point, 49-48, with 10:47 to play in the game after making up most of an 11-point halftime deficit, but the Knights would outscore the visitors, 29-20, through the final whistle for the 10-point victory. Kamil Svrdlik scored 24 points from the home side while Mike Scott chipped in 17 with eight assists.

BRYANT vs. THE NORTHEAST CONFERENCE
The Bulldogs enter Thursday's contest having won three-straight NEC contests and are an even 3-3 against their home league on the 2010-11 season. Bryant has gone 10-28 against current Northeast Conference members since joining the Division I ranks, with six of those wins coming in the program's inaugural DI season in 2008-09. All-time against current Northeast Conference members, the Bulldog basketball program is 38-82, having most frequently faced off against former Northeast-10 Conference (DII) member Quinnipiac (17-39).

COMMON DENOMINATOR
Outside Northeast Conference competition, Bryant and Fairleigh Dickinson have faced off against just a single common foe this season, with both programs taking on Iona College during the 2010-11 campaign. The Bulldogs earned their first victory of the season when they took on the Gaels on Nov. 14 in the closing game of the World Vision Classic in Cleveland, Ohio, topping Iona, 74-72, on a Raphael Jordan buzzerbeater three. The Knights suffered a different fate, falling to Iona, 87-66, on the road on Dec. 11, the second of nine-straight losses.

LAST TIME OUT
Sophomore Frankie Dobbs scored a career-high 22 points and rookie forward Alex Francis recorded his fifth double-double of the season to lead the Bryant University men's basketball team to its third-consecutive victory, a 72-59 topping of Northeast Conference rival Sacred Heart, Saturday afternoon at the William H. Pitt Center.

The win came courtesy of 55.6 percent shooting (25-of-45) for the Bulldogs, the team's best shooting percentage of the season, and is the second time the Black and Gold have eclipsed the 50 percent mark from the field during the current stretch. Saturday's victory marks the program's first winning streak since the 2008-09 season and its first win over Sacred Heart in the Division I era.

Bryant led the whole way Saturday afternoon after making up a 3-2 deficit in the first two minutes of the game, putting forth a stiff defense right out of the gates against the Pioneers to open up an 18-5 lead in the opening seven minutes.

The Bulldogs would take their largest edge of the day at the 8:20 mark, opening a 25-9 advantage over the home side with a Francis free throw. From there, though, Sacred Heart would slowly start to chip away at the visitors' lead, digging in on defense as Bryant hands gave away six turnovers in the final eight minutes of the frame. The Pioneers would score at twice the rate of the Bulldogs to cut the score to 34-27 with 70 seconds to play in the half, and Bryant would add the final basket of the session to enter intermission with a 36-27 edge.

And while it looked like the Pioneers were poised to make a comeback early on in the second frame – the home side cut the lead to just five points, 51-46, on a Chris Evans jumper with 11:10 to play – the Bulldogs would quickly put a stop to any follies on the court from there, building their edge back up to double digits just over a minute later.

Bryant's lead would linger around the 10-point mark for the next seven minutes, giving up no ground to the hosts and forcing the Pioneers into an early fouling game. The Bulldogs would go 7-of-8 from the charity stripe down the stretch, including a perfect 6-for-6 mark from Dobbs, to secure the 13-point victory and the team's first winning streak of the season.

Bryant took far fewer shots than the home side in the both halves and was outshot, 73-45, on the day. But the visiting Black and Gold converted at a sizzling 60.9 percent clip in the first session while holding the Pioneers to 25 percent shooting from the floor, and shot 50 percent to SHU's 29.7 percent in the final 20 minutes for the season-high 55.6 percent mark.

Sophomore guard Raphael Jordan had one of the best games of his career and his best performance of the season in the win, going 7-for-9 from the floor in 35 minutes of action for a season-high 15 points. Francis's 12 points complimented a team-high 11 rebounds, while senior Cecil Gresham chipped in 12 points of his own with a contest-high three blocks on the day.

GOING STREAKING
The Bulldogs equaled the program's longest winning streak of its short Division I history Saturday when Bryant won its third-straight contest, a 72-59 victory over Sacred Heart on the road. The streak, which began Saturday, Jan. 8 at home against St. Francis (NY), marks the first such stretch of the 2010-11 campaign and the program's first winning streak since earning three-straight wins from Jan. 31, 2009 through Feb. 7, 2009 (at Saint Francis (PA), 65-60; at Monmouth, 83-71; at Quinnipiac, 72-68). Bryant's last three victories have featured a number of career and season highlights, including an NEC Rookie of the Week selection (Alex Francis), a new career high (22 points, Frankie Dobbs), the team's seventh double-double of the year (Francis, fifth personal), the two highest shooting percentages of the season (.523 vs. St. Francis, .556 at Sacred Heart) and the lowest opponent shooting percentage (.274 at Sacred Heart), to name just a few. Saturday's win also marked the first time Bryant has topped the Pioneers at the Division I level. Dobbs, Francis and Cecil Gresham have all averaged double-figure scoring over the stretch — 15.0 ppg, 13.3 ppg and 14.0 ppg, respectively — while Francis has averaged 9.0 boards per outing. Seven Bulldogs have shot 42 percent or better during the winning streak, while three players have shooting clips of 50 percent or higher.

FRANCIS EARNS FOURTH NEC ROOKIE OF THE WEEK SELECTION
Frosh forward Alex Francis earned his league-leading fourth Choice Hotels NEC Rookie of the Week honor Jan. 17, garnering the award for his monster performance in Bryant's two-win week. The 6-foot-6 bigman averaged a near double-double for the Bulldogs, posting 17.0 points and a team-leading 9.5 rebounds per game while shooting shot 50 percent from the field. Francis scored double-figure points in all both contests, scoring a game-high 22 points on the road against Quinnipiac before posting his fifth double-double of the year (12p, 11r) against Sacred Heart. Currently, the Harlem, N.Y. native ranks first in the NEC in rebounding, averaging 8.2 rpg on the year, 10th in scoring (14.5 ppg) and is second in double-doubles this season. He leads the rookie ranks in all three categories. Francis earned back-to-back rookie of the week accolades Nov. 15 and Nov. 22 — the first two weeks of the 2010-11 campaign — and earned his third on Jan. 3 to open the new year.

UP NEXT
Bryant continues on its four-game homestand with a 4:00 p.m. matchup against Monmouth on Saturday, Jan. 22 at the Chace Athletic Center. The game will be the second half of a doubleheader that features the Bryant women hosting the Hawks at 1:00 p.m.