BULLDOGS LOOK TO EXTEND STREAK TO FIVE STRAIGHT SATURDAY AGAINST MONMOUTH

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SMITHFIELD, R.I. – The Bryant University men's basketball team will try to defend the longest winning streak in the program's Division I history Saturday afternoon at home against Northeast Conference foe Monmouth University.

The Bulldogs (6-13, 4-3 NEC) look to win their fifth-straight contest and third-consecutive home game when the teams tip off from the Chace Athletic Center at 4:00 p.m. as the second half of a men's/women's NEC doubleheader. Saturday's game can be heard live locally on WOON 1240AM or online at www.bryantbulldogs.com and a live webcast can be seen at www.bryantbulldogs.tv.

THE SERIES
This is the fifth meeting all-time between the Bulldogs and the Hawks, and Bryant looks to cut down its deficit in the series to 3-2 with a win Saturday at home. The Bulldogs began the series on a high note during the 2008-09 season — the Bulldogs' inaugural Division I campaign — taking the first-ever meeting between the programs at Monmouth's old home, Boylan Gym, 83-71, on Feb. 5, 2009. The win still marks the most points the program has scored in a single game since joining the Division I ranks, but the Black and Gold haven't topped the Hawks since, dropping a pair of contests last season, 67-62 and 50-46, as well as this season's earlier meeting, 66-57.

LAST TIME AGAINST MONMOUTH
The Bulldogs held an 11-point lead at the halftime break, 28-17, having played one of the team's best halves of the year, but struggled in the final frame to allow the Hawks a 20-point swing for the eventual 66-57 victory on Jan. 3 to open 2011 action. Rookie Alex Francis and sophomore point guard Frankie Dobbs each scored a game-high 15 points to pace the Black and Gold, while second-year bigman Vlad Kondratyev pulled in a team-best 10 rebounds. Bryant scored 16 points off 13 Monmouth turnovers in the first stanza, but couldn't keep up the defense, as the Hawks outscored the visiting Bulldogs, 49-29, in the final 20 minutes, shooting 50 percent from the floor. Ed Waite led the hosts with 14 points, while Jordan Davis recorded the game's only double-double with 12 points and a game-high 13 boards.

SCOUTING THE HAWKS
Monmouth has lost five straight entering Saturday's contest, having earned its last win the last time the team faced off against Bryant, a 66-57 win back on January 3 in West Long Branch, N.J. No Hawk averages double-figure scoring numbers on the season, while Ed Waite leads the Monmouth ranks with 9.7 points per game and 5.7 boards per outing. Jesse Steele chips in 8.7 points per outing and Phil Wait's 54.3 percent shooting and 14 blocks lead the Hawks. James Hett, the team's only 19-game starter, paces the side in assists, with 72, and steals, with 26. As a team, Monmouth shoots just a shade under 40 percent from the field on the year and averages just 59 points per contest.

BRYANT vs. THE NORTHEAST CONFERENCE
The Bulldogs enter Saturday's contest having won four-straight NEC contests and are above .500 in league play (4-3) for the first time in the program's two-year history within the Northeast Conference. Bryant has gone 11-28 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 NEC members, the Bulldog basketball program is 39-82, having most frequently faced off against former Northeast-10 Conference (DII) member Quinnipiac (17-39).

COMMON DENOMINATOR
Outside Northeast Conference competition, Bryant and Monmouth have faced off against just two common opponents this season. Both squads have taken on Lehigh University (Patriot League) and Harvard (Ivy League) in 2010-11, with both sides falling to the Crimson. But the results against the Mountain Hawks were different, as Monmouth topped Lehigh, 69-68, at home on Nov. 19, just days before the Bulldogs fell at Stabler Arena, 88-68.

LAST TIME OUT
Frankie Dobbs scored a career-high 25 points including the game-winning 3-point basket with 2.5 seconds left to send the Bryant University men's basketball team to a thrilling 74-71 Northeast Conference win over Fairleigh Dickinson Thursday evening at the Chace Athletic Center.

Bryant, winners of four straight, shot a sizzling 54.9 percent from the floor, including 58 percent in the second stanza. It was the second-straight game in which the Bulldogs shot better than 50 percent and the third time in the last four outings.

Dobbs was 7-for-10 shooting from the floor in the game, including a 7-for-9 mark from 3-point range and a perfect 4-for-4 from the line, scoring 19 of his 25 points in the second frame. Alex Francis was also productive from the field, as the freshman forward finished with 16 points on 7-of-10 shooting as well.

Thursday's game was a tight contest throughout, highlighted by a second half that featured 12 ties and nine lead changes alone as neither team held a lead larger than eight points all night.

With the game tied, 56-56, with 7:30 left to play, the Bulldogs put together a nice 8-0 spurt, keyed by a long three from Dobbs on the left side and another trey from the corner. Bryant would go to Dobbs again, but this time his 3-pointer rimmed out for teammate Barry Latham, who got the tip-in to give Bryant a 64-56 edge with just over four minutes to play.

But the visiting Knights would answer with a run of their own. Two treys from FDU's Mike Scott (team-high 20 points) quickly brought the Knights back to within a point, 65-64, with 2:20 left on the clock. Moments later, Scott would turn a Bryant giveaway into a basket at the other end, as the 6-foot guard weaved his way through the lane for a tough basket, giving the Knights a 66-65 lead.

Tied at 67-67 with a minute to go, Latham found a wide open Cecil Gresham (13 points) out on the wing to put the Bulldogs up by two, but a free throw and three-pointer by Scott with 24 seconds left would knot the game up once again at 71-71.

But the Bulldogs would respond, as Dobbs came off a screen from the left side deep in 3-point land to connect for the game-winning basket with under three seconds to play and send the Bulldogs to the 74-71 win and the longest winning streak of the program's short Division I history.

GOING STREAKING: Bulldogs earn program's longest DI winning streak
The Bulldogs established the program's longest winning streak of its short Division I history Thursday night with a last-second 74-71 win over NEC foe Fairleigh Dickinson, the team's fourth-straight victory. Bryant's current streak, which began Saturday, Jan. 8 at home against St. Francis (NY), marks the first winning 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 four victories have featured a number of career and season highlights, including the fourth NEC Rookie of the Week selection for Alex Francis, a pair of new career highs for starting point guard Frankie Dobbs (22 points at Sacred Heart, then 25 vs. FDU), the team's seventh double-double of the year (Francis, fifth personal), the three-highest shooting percentages of the season (.556 at Sacred Heart, .549 vs. FDU, .523 vs. St. Francis) and the lowest opponent shooting percentage (.274 at Sacred Heart), to name just a few. Last Saturday's win over Sacred Heart 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 — 17.5 ppg, 14.0 ppg and 13.8 ppg, respectively — while Francis has averaged 7.8 boards per outing. Six Bulldogs have shot better than 45 percent from the floor during the current winning streak, while five players have shooting clips of 50 percent or higher, led by Francis's 54.1 percent mark.

FRANK-INCENSED
Sophomore point guard and floor general Frankie Dobbs was more than impressive in the Bulldogs' 74-71 victory over the Knights Thursday at the Chace Athletic Center. Dobbs vaulted the team to its fourth-straight win with a 70 percent shooting mark (7-of-10), including a remarkable 7-of-9 clip from beyond the arc for a career-high and game-best 25 points. No 3-pointer was more important than his final one, though, as Dobbs drained a deep trey from the left side with 2.4 seconds remaining on the clock to break a 71-71 tie and secure the three-point victory.

UNDER PRESSURE
Frankie Dobbs's 3-pointer that won the game for the Bulldogs, 74-71, with 2.4 seconds to play Thursday night against FDU marked the program's fifth DI-era victory taken in the final seconds of a contest and was the third such win this season. The Bulldogs have taken two of those last-second victories during the team's current four-game winning streak, a run that was started on January 8 with a Corey Maynard trifecta that put the Bulldogs on top of league foe St. Francis (NY), 67-64, with just 4.3 seconds left on the clock. Sophomore Raphael Jordan has two of the other three winning shots, scoring the Bulldogs' only true DI buzzerbeater (see Mr. Game Winner) on Nov. 14, 2010 for a win over Iona, 74-72, and sinking a pair of free throws with 0.8 seconds remaining against Wagner last season for the team's only win of the 2009-10 campaign.

The only other Bulldog win in a game's final seconds? A 57-55 victory over Long Island on Jan. 24, 2009, when then-sophomore Adam Parzych hit a layup with 2.1 seconds on the clock.

UP NEXT
Bryant continues on its four-game homestand Thursday night (Jan. 27) with a 7:00 p.m. matchup against Wagner College at the Chace Athletic Center. The Bulldogs earned their only win of the 2009-10 season against the Seahawks the last time the two programs met.