Sunday, December 18, 2022 1:00 p.m.
Gentile Arena, Chicago, Ill.
The Albany Great Danes visit Gentile Arena Sunday afternoon for only their second game ever against the Ramblers. Loyola beat Albany 68-56 back in December 2009, in the middle of a seven-game winning streak.
Back in the early 2000s, the Danes had a good stretch from 2006 to 2015, when they made the NCAA tournament five times in the 10-year stretch. Albany is a member of the America East Conference, where they were picked to finish sixth in the preseason poll this season in a league where Vermont is usually one of the top teams.
These days,
Albany is coached by Dwayne Killings, a kid who grew up playing high school ball in Amherst Massachusetts and became a walk-on under Steve Lappas at UMass. Earlier this year, UMass beat the Great Danes 87-73 on Dec. 5. Killings went on to become an assistant at Boston University and associate head coach at Marquette under Steve Wojciechowski before getting the gig at Albany.
Coach Killings is in his second year as head coach. He's likely to start three guards and two forwards: 6'5" senior guard Gerald Drumgoole, 6'5" senior Tray Hutcheson, 6'2" freshman Marcus Jackson, 6'7" sophomore forward Aaron Reddish, and 6'9" freshman Jonathan Beagle. Drumgoole leads the team with 14.3 points per game and 2.2 assists per contest-- he's their on-court leader who plays more minutes than anyone else. Beagle, despite being a freshman, has shown some maturity while averaging 11.0 points and 7.5 rebounds in his first season. Last time out, in a 76-59 win over LIU, Beagle led the team with 17 points and five assists. Reddish is the third leading scorer with 9.9 points per game. Hutcheson doesn't do much scoring, and Jackson was making just his second start last time out.
The bench players include 6'3" senior guard Sarju Patel (6.7 ppg), 6'1" senior guard DaKquawn Davis (7.6 ppg), 5'10" junior point guard Malik Edmead, and 6'7" sophomore Tairi Ketner, a 260-pound forward. The coach likes to mix up his starters sometimes to reward good attitudes.
Albany comes into this game 4-8 on the season, with wins over LIU, Presbyterian, and two non-Division I schools. They lost to a pretty good Towson team by only five points on the road to open the season, and their schedule has been pretty tough (UMass, Providence, St. Joseph’s, and a KenPom top 50 opponent in Florida Atlantic), and they have Loyola on Sunday, NIU on Tuesday and a game at Virginia coming up.
The Ramblers need to continue the improvement they’ve shown in taking care of the ball, building an offensive rhythm, and clamping down on defense. Loyola also needs to tune up after eight days off to get ready for Stanford on Thursday, the last chance for a quality win out of conference.
Loyola game notes: https://loyolaramblers.com/documents/20 ... Notes1.pdfAlbany game notes: https://ualbanysports.com/news/2022/12/ ... -city.aspxTV/Streaming video: ESPN+
https://www.espn.com/watch/player/_/eve ... /401487661Radio/Streaming audio: https://loyolaramblers.com/watch/?Live=129&type=LiveLive stats: https://stats.statbroadcast.com/broadcast/?id=426262Vegas odds: Loyola by 16.5