Northeastern is now 7-5 in CAA play, which is a respectable mark. But take a closer look, and one notices problems. One is that they are now three games out of fourth place, which means they need some help if they are to ultimately get a bye in the conference tournament next month. That has meant everything over the years, and it’s very difficult to win four games in four days. Perhaps more importantly, the Huskies have put that record together only against the teams they “should” beat. The Huskies are 0-4 against the teams that are ahead of them in the standings.

This is about what was expected of the Huskies. They have just one senior on the roster, Niagara transfer Kashief Edwards, so this team looked to be about a year away from contending. They were one of several teams that one could put in a hat and pull them out when trying to project the middle of the pack before the season. There is some experience in the backcourt, but youth up front, and depth was an unknown. The youth up front has shown plenty of promise, adding to the idea that this team could contend next year.

In fact, that the Huskies are even in the first division of the CAA might seem like a case of over-achieving when looking at their non-conference record. A six-game losing streak in December doesn’t usually foreshadow being 7-5 at this point in conference play. The issues the Huskies showed in December – turnovers and a lack of backcourt depth – are still around, although the former has been lessened. But the lack of backcourt means starting guards Jonathan Lee and Joel Smith are playing without much rest, and will be more likely to wear down later in the season.

If the Huskies don’t at least continue to knock off the teams they should beat, they could slip back in the standings quite easily. They are now tied for fifth with Georgia State, and Delaware is breathing down their neck one game back. Both teams have proven themselves against the conference’s best teams. The Panthers handed Drexel their only loss in the last 17 games and have won at VCU, the latter marking the only time the Rams have lost at home all season. The Blue Hens almost beat the Huskies at Matthews Arena just a week earlier, beat Drexel in December and knocked off George Mason on Wednesday night.

There is still time for Northeastern to change where they stand. The Huskies are at VCU on Saturday and get George Mason at home on February 22. Last season, the Huskies had their struggles but managed to knock off VCU along the way. That game was in Boston, but it’s proof that a team like this is capable of beating one of the contenders. A month left in the regular season is a good amount of time for improvement to happen, especially in the crucial backcourt area off the bench since the two reserves there are freshmen.

But right now, where Northeastern stands is clear in the CAA. They are not contenders yet, and until they knock off a team ahead of them in the standings, that’s where they will be. They will continue to be a year away.

• Boston University was not rebounding well in the early portion of their seven-game winning streak. But in the last two games, the Terriers have dominated the glass, and keeping that up will only help. Granted, it came against two of the worst teams in the conference, but one of them (UMBC) is normally a decent team on the glass. Part of that has come from an emphasis on rebounding of late, but not just at the defensive end.“The last two games, we’ve done a much better job on the glass,” said head coach Joe Jones. “We’re just trying to make a concerted effort to be a better offensive rebounding team as well.”
• One of the keys to Marquette‘s play has been the play of transfer Jamil Wilson. The Oregon transfer isn’t putting up big numbers, but he had 16 points on Saturday night at Providence to go with three blocked shots. Three nights later, he blocked three more shots to help the Golden Eagles shut down USF, and he is filling the stat sheet more and more.”I think he’s become incredibly, incredibly important to what we’re doing,” said head coach Buzz Williams. “I think with each passing day, regardless of game day or practice day, I think his confidence continues to grow. I think he helps us hide some of our deficiencies because of his intelligence, particularly on the defensive end.”
• Northeastern somehow pulled out a win on Wednesday night over Delaware that may make a difference for them. The Huskies had lost two straight after a good start, but came home for a win that may get them going again. Joel Smith hit his second game-winning basket in less than a month, having made a buzzer-beater at Vermont on December 30, and looks to be playing much better although he struggled in the two recent road losses. The big key, he said, is being engaged at both ends of the floor, and head coach Bill Coen noted that they have only lost once when Smith has six or more rebounds.”I’m trying to be more involved, especially rebounding and defense,” said Smith. “Once you do the little things, the game just flows and it comes to you.”
• St. John’s showed on Wednesday night that although they are young, they will be able to beat a top team or two before the season is out. They beat West Virginia convincingly, and all along they have looked like a scrappy team that will not go down easily.
• Staying in the Big East, Notre Dame‘s win at Seton Hall is another solid win for the Fighting Irish. If they keep this up, Mike Brey should be in the mix for Big East Coach of the Year. Meanwhile, Seton Hall has come back to earth a bit of late as they are now 4-4 in Big East play.
• St. Mary’s picked up a big road win on Thursday night as they went to Los Angeles and came away with a 71-64 win over Loyola Marymount. There are more road tests ahead for this team, but getting a win in LA is a good way to keep up the winning.
• Five teams are tied atop the Atlantic 10 with 4-2 records, but Xavier and Temple are not among them. Instead, it’s Dayton, La Salle, UMass, Saint Louis and St. Bonaventure. Temple and Xavier are right behind them, but chances are few figured a five-way tie would not include those two.
• Iona heads to Fairfield on Friday night in a game that may have lost a bit of luster from before MAAC play began in earnest. The Stags are 5-3, and they could make things a little more interesting with a win as Iona is 7-2 and being talked about as a team that should be in one of the better BracketBusters matchups.

Northeastern started the non-conference slate with some promising results, winning at arch-rival Boston University in overtime in the season opener and picking up a win at St. John’s before November was out. The Huskies didn’t seem primed to be as good as they were a couple of years ago, but it was a good start as they were 3-1 after winning in Queens.

Then December came, and the Huskies ran into backcourt issues. Behind juniors Jonathan Lee and Joel Smith are only freshmen, and they have had some struggles. At one point, Northeastern had at least 20 turnovers in five straight games, and not surprisingly they lost all five. In the meantime, the reserve guards weren’t getting a lot of minutes, and the Huskies at times put out a lineup that really had just one true guard on the floor.

But the Huskies closed out 2011 playing well, getting a big win at Vermont on a buzzer-beater, and since the calendar turned over they have been better. They have won six of seven, and the win over a Georgia State team that had won 13 of 14 is a big one for this team. Along the way, a key freshman has developed into a budding star in Quincy Ford, and it has happened as this team has been winning games.

Ford scored 14 points and was 4-5 from long range on Wednesday night. He also filled the stat sheet with five rebounds and three steals, and also had a key blocked shot in the second half. The team’s third-leading scorer is second in that category in conference games, having reached double figures in four of the last five games now and getting his first career double-double last week. For good measure, he leads the team in rebounding and steals.

The CAA has a lot of young talent starting their college careers off well, and Ford is right there with the best of them, especially since conference play began.

“His versatility makes us a much better basketball team,” said head coach Bill Coen. “As scary as it sounds, he doesn’t know how good he can be.”

The Huskies now head into the conference’s annual stretch of four games in eight days, and they start it on the road at Drexel on Saturday and Old Dominion on Monday. The Dragons, who were preseason favorites and then had a so-so non-conference showing in part because of injuries, will come in with five straight wins, while the Monarchs are 6-1 and already came to Boston last month and left with a victory. On the flip side, the Huskies have a 3-0 road record in CAA play thus far.

Northeastern is still in need of more answers in the backcourt. Coen seems satisfied with the improvement of Alwayne Bigby, known more for his defense and competitive streak, at the offensive end, and he’s played as one of the guards at times. Ford has helped as well since he can handle and pass. But it wouldn’t hurt if either or both of freshmen Marco Banegas-Flores and Demetrius Pollard, the latter of whom sat out Wednesday night due to a sprained ankle suffered in practice, played well enough to get more minutes. Both Lee and Smith played 39 minutes on Wednesday night, and Lee leads the CAA in minutes at over 36 per game. In CAA play that number is well over 37.

Coen said the Huskies seemed to learn well from the non-conference slate. While they would like to have had a few more wins, and had a shot in a few of the games, he pointed to games like St. John’s as a game against a team that plays a style much like that of a conference opponent that they could draw from. Princeton, who beat the Huskies during the six-game losing streak in December when turnovers were a major issue, was a team they could look at when preparing for William & Mary, who they beat last week.

Northeastern has a tough stretch ahead that will give an idea of whether this team will be a contender or not. They go into that stretch with a good road record and playing well, all at a good time.

The Huskies only played two true guards on Sunday, and spent some time with just one on the floor. At times, the shooting guard spot was occupied by sophomore Alwayne Bigby or senior Kashief Edwards, neither of whom is a guard. While freshman Quincy Ford has some guard skills, he’s more like a big wing, with better ball skills than Kauri Black, who handled the ball a little too much on Sunday as he led the Huskies with five turnovers.

In light of that, it’s not much of a surprise that the Huskies had 20 turnovers in the game, with all five starters having at least two. But perhaps more important than the number is that many came at bad times. In the second half, the Huskies fell behind early as the Tigers began with a 15-2 run aided by three early turnovers. Several times, the Huskies tried to rally back, but invariably a turnover would keep them from getting or sustaining momentum. And on a day where Princeton shot 12-18 from the field in the second half, that wasn’t the recipe for success.

But the story doesn’t end there, unfortunately for the Huskies. It marked the fourth straight game where they gave the ball away 20 or more times, and each one has been a loss. The turnovers, along with allowing Princeton to shoot over 54 percent, helped the Huskies lose despite shooting 50 percent from the field.

“I think it’s decision-making,” head coach Bill Coen said. “We just have to make better decisions in those types of situations, particularly when you’re playing against Princeton, because if you give the ball back to them you have to sit down in a stance for 35 seconds and really have to guard their stuff, which is not easy to do as guys find out.”

Jonathan Lee, who has made admirable strides at the point even though he’s not the truest point guard, played 38 minutes on Sunday, while Joel Smith played 34. That meant eight minutes on the court were occupied by someone who is not a guard. It continues a trend in recent games, as in the prior game at Bradley, only two guards got off the bench for less than seven combined minutes.

This is a problem that may not get better soon. The only two guards who have seen minutes off the bench of late are freshmen Marco Banegas-Flores and Demetrius Pollard, and given the lineups that have been out there, it’s clear the coaching staff isn’t comfortable having either out there for extended minutes right now. It’s also led to players like Black handling the ball more and trying to do too much, and putting more pressure on the forwards to take care of the ball when they get it.

At the beginning of the season, the experience of the starting guards looked to be a plus for this team. If you’re going to have one unit be experienced and the other to not be, it’s best to have experienced guards and inexperienced frontcourt players, which is largely how this Husky team appeared although Black and Ryan Pierson got a lot of minutes last year and Edwards is a senior transfer. But now, the backcourt isn’t looking like a source of strength, and that doesn’t bode well with CAA play not being far away.

Northeastern has two more games in short succession, heading to Louisiana Tech on Tuesday and North Carolina State on Thursday before Christmas. After that, only a trip to Vermont remains before CAA play begins in earnest at winless Towson. There’s not much time left, and the personnel isn’t going to change, so a solution has to emerge soon if their fortunes are to move in the right direction.

The one statistic that will leap out at you is rebounding. Northeastern out-rebounded Boston University 52-32, and it wasn’t just the raw numbers that tell the story. The Huskies rebounded 19 of 39 available misses of their shots, and 33 of 45 available Terrier misses. They had a 22-11 edge in second-chance points. Two players, include one of the freshmen, had double-doubles with points and rebounds.

One of the holdovers, Kauri Black, had 12 points and eight rebounds before fouling out. But he only played 19 minutes due to his foul trouble, and after he was big in the first half the junior forward was a non-factor after intermission.

“We need him available to us at the end of basketball games. We can’t have him DQ’d,” head coach Bill Coen said of Black. “He’s just got to be a little more disciplined on those fouls. But those reach-in fouls, he’s got to stay away from it if we’re going to be as good a basketball team as we want to be.”

The other frontcourt holdover, Ryan Pierson, was a CAA All-Rookie selection last season. On Friday, he played 12 non-descript minutes. That’s where the freshmen come in.

Quincy Ford had seven points, four boards and two assists. Those aren’t eye-popping numbers, but he was able to match up with BU’s frontcourt, especially since the Terriers play a four-out, one-in offense and their post players aren’t their best scoring threats. Reggie Spencer put forth the best numbers, posting 16 points and 10 rebounds before fouling out, and five of those rebounds were at the offensive end. He scored 12 of those points after intermission, helping out immensely with Black’s struggles.

“We were very fortunate to convince Reggie to come to Boston all the way from Alabama,” said Coen while talking about how Spencer could help the team. “He’s got a huge heart, and I think for a first college game that was pretty impressive.”

Spencer is the one who could be the difference-maker, and was on Friday. Coen said that rebounding was an issue they had to address in recruiting, and last season proved it as only two CAA teams were out-rebounded by a bigger margin than the Huskies. That it was an issue in the first place was a little surprising considering one of his assistants is Antonio Reynolds-Dean, who was an excellent rebounder at Rhode Island when Coen was an assistant there. Reynolds-Dean sought to find a player who could help on the glass, a player who was similar to how he was, when out recruiting last year. One state away from where he grew up, it appears he found that player, as Reynolds-Dean grew up in Atlanta and Spencer comes to Northeastern by way of Hillcrest in Alabama, the same school that former Indiana forward D.J. White attended.

“(Rebounding) has been a point of emphasis for us,” Coen said. “You have to do the job on the backboards. Reggie made a huge difference in that regard.”

The Husky guards will be fine, as Jonathan Lee capably ran the show and Joel Smith had a double-double with a team-high 20 points and 12 boards after a slow start. The wing also looks to be better as they get back the ultra-competitive Alwayne Bigby, who had seven points and eight boards (including a big stickback with 30 seconds left in overtime that made it a two-possession game, and gain Niagara transfer Kashief Edwards, who will be a scrappy hustle player. Between the two of them, the Huskies don’t figure to get great scoring, but they’ll play within the flow of the offense and compete every second they are on the floor. That position is better than it has been in recent years, where at times it has been a weak spot.

Northeastern next takes on UMass on Monday night in Amherst. The Minutemen have some size up front, but now the Huskies look much better equipped to handle it. The last time these two teams metat the Mullins Center, which was in December 2004, the Huskies won (they played two years later in the Colonial Classic in Pittsburgh). They will have a shot to do it again this time around.

The frontcourt is where Northeastern’s biggest concerns were from a personnel standpoint. If Friday’s game is any indication, there is a little less concern there right now for the Huskies.

And sadly, it’s relevant to things to come in the larger picture of college basketball.

Northeastern’s 82-74 win over Boston University in overtime isn’t a story of utmost national significance all by itself. It barely registers on an opening night with several intriguing matchups to go with the Carrier Classic. And the rivalry between these schools isn’t exactly Duke-North Carolina; in fact, it’s not even on the level of Old Dominion-VCU. But it’s an old rivalry that means something to both schools and their fans.

It’s hard to remember the last time Case Gym was as packed as it was on Friday night, save for the occasions the Terriers have hosted a conference title game. At times, you could feel the floor shaking on press row. There were fans sitting in the aisles and on the front row (not in seats) on Friday night, a sign of how many people showed up. Both schools made an effort to get people to come to the game, and it showed. The fact that it was the season opener for both teams surely helped, as every team hopes to have a good crowd for their home opener.

And while the NBA lockout is no doubt a contributor, this is still Boston, where most sports fans probably cared a lot more about reports of Jonathan Papelbon signing with the Philadelphia Phillies than the great game being played at Case Gym.

It was a game between two cross-town rivals, one that means something to the teams and their fans, hence they got up for it. The two schools have now met 139 times in their history. And unfortunately, such rivalries are losing their feeling and impact because of the changing landscape.

Already, it’s a shame that Northeastern and Boston University only play once a season. The two schools are perhaps a ten-minute drive through the city from each other and are very similar. They’ve been rivals away from the athletic playing field, to the point where Northeastern used to market itself as the school that gets all the kids that can’t afford to go to Boston University. (Nowadays, if you can’t afford one you can’t afford the other.) And their basketball teams have a long history that includes some memorable showdown games in regular season and in the conference tournament back when they were in the same conference.

Look throughout the landscape, and you’ll see there are lots of great rivalries – bigger than Northeaster-Boston University – that we have lost and will soon lose with conference realignment. When Boston College left the Big East, that meant they only play Providence once a year. Syracuse’s imminent departure from the Big East means they don’t play Georgetown or Connecticut, or at least will play them no more than once a year. Pittsburgh’s departure for the ACC, followed by West Virginia leaving for the Big 12, means an end to their games with West Virginia (or at least, just once a year). We will soon lose Texas A&M-Texas, which is a bigger rivalry in football much like Colorado-Nebraska. In the worst one of all, Kansas and Missouri may no longer play unless they meet in a postseason tournament now that Missouri is heading for the SEC.

And the list will go on, as the picture hardly seems settled. There are surely more maneuvers still to come, and most feel that four 16-team conferences is an inevitable result.

It didn’t take being in Case Gym on Friday night to drive it home, but anyone who was there had to wonder: is it really worth making the move to another conference in exchange for, among other things, losing great rivalries?

Friday night’s game was a great way for both schools to open the college basketball season. The last couple of years, the game has felt like a rivalry game with its atmosphere, and that’s how it should be. But it also leaves you wanting more. It leaves you looking forward to the next meeting between the two, in this case across town near Huntington Ave. Then reality sets in: they’re only playing once this season. And before long, more rivalries just like this will still be fierce on game day, but it won’t feel the same because they only play once each season.

Projected starting five:

Jr. G Jonathan Lee
Jr. G Joel Smith
So. G-F Alwayne Bigby
So. F Ryan Pierson
Jr. F Kauri Black

Important departures:

G Chaisson Allen (16.7 ppg, 6.1 rpg) graduated and G Alex Harris (6.4 ppg, 2.0 rpg) transferred.

Returning:

64.3 percent of scoring and 69.2 percent of rebounding

Additions:

Sr. G/F Kashief Edwards, a transfer from Niagara
Fr. G Marco Banegas-Flores
Fr. F Quincy Ford
Fr. G Demetrius Pollard
Fr. F Reggie Spencer

Schedule highlights:

The Huskies open at cross-town rival Boston University and have just three home games in nonconference plus a BracketBusters game. The most notable home games are against Southern Illinois and Ivy League contender Princeton, while they’ll travel far and wide: St. John’s, La Salle, Bradley, Louisiana Tech, North Carolina State and Vermont. As if that’s not enough, when CAA play begins in earnest in January, three of the first four are on the road and they have three straight on the road in February.

Projected finish and outlook:

The Huskies are a tough team to project, as they lost their leader and perhaps their most talented player with Harris’ transfer. But Harris also had a very up-and-down season, and with four starters back and the return of Alwayne Bigby after having to redshirt, this team won’t be lacking in experience as was the case last season. Add in Edwards, who will certainly contribute and might start on the wing, and the Huskies could be a sleeper even though they appear to be a year away from contending.

Lee and Smith, the former of whom is a solid defender, made nice strides last year but must be leaders this year in addition to repeating that improvement. Black has potential and has had his moments but has often seemed to need a push, and he’ll get that from the talented newcomers up front. Pierson showed he can be a steady glue guy, and Bigby is a competitor who will lead the defense. The Huskies struggled at the defensive end and on the glass last year, so that’s the main area that needs strengthening if they are to jump in the standings.

Next: Old Dominion Monarchs

Back to CAA preview

• Miami‘s hire of Jim Larranaga is an excellent one, and an interesting move for the 61-year-old coach. Larranaga was thought to be in his final job after turning down opportunities a few years ago, at a school where he could win every year and a conference in which he was the dean of coaches. The school paid him well and he made money as a motivational speaker after leading George Mason to the Final Four. But as one person pointed out, there’s no risk here. If things don’t work out and he is let go, he can retire in 4-5 years anyway and after picking up more money.
• Princeton should have never let Sydney Johnson get away. Remember the emotion he showed after the Tigers knocked off Harvard in the one-game playoff at Yale? Every last ounce of that was genuine. That man genuinely loves his alma mater, but they wouldn’t up the ante enough to keep him from going somewhere else. It would be one thing if he left Dartmouth for Fairfield, but Princeton is one of the Ivy League’s signature programs and has a great tradition. They shouldn’t be losing one of their own because they won’t pay competitively.
• VCU‘s run to the Final Four was just the start. First Shaka Smart signed an extension, and the Rams got more good news as they signed Teddy Okereafor earlier this week, and he will come to the school a year earlier. The 6’3″ point guard was continuing to play with his travel team prior to signing, as if the plan was to be a senior next season, and should give the Rams an immediate boost as he knows how to run a team. When he was on the floor for his team, the offense just seemed to run so much better. With Joey Rodriguez among the departed Rams this year, Okereafor should get minutes right away.
• Don’t be surprised if Reggie Jackson stays in the draft, and not because Boston College will be in rebuilding mode next season. Jackson has great length for being 6’3″, is very quick and has started to fulfill some of the potential one could see he had when he first got to Chestnut Hill. He had a breakout year and can still get better, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if someone likes him enough to want to take him in the first round.
• Already, there are some school changes happening for next year, and talk of more is going on. St. Mark’s will add Aaron Falzon (Fr. SF, Newton (MA) North HS) and Aaron McLean (PF, Southborough (MA) Fay School) next year. Falzon will repeat his freshman year, while McLean will enter high school as a member of the class of 2015. Additionally, Tyler McFarland (6’6″ SF-PF, Rockport (ME)) will head to Cushing Academy for post-graduate year and Drew Crudup (6’1″ SG, New Haven (CT)) will head to Lee Academy for a fifth year.
• Northeastern picked up a local talent as point guard Marco Banegas, who is finishing up a post-graduate year at Brimmer & May, verbally committed to the school. The Dorchester native has plenty of talent, and if he plays like a pass-first point guard he can be an excellent pickup for them. The Huskies had a difficult season with a very young team, and they lost their leader in Chaisson Allen. Banegas will have an opportunity to play right away if he puts the work in, especially since Alex Harris is transferring.

• Georgia State big man James Vincent didn’t have big numbers, but you couldn’t help but notice him. He scored six points on 3-3 shooting, but all came on nice post moves to get close shots. UNC Wilmington doesn’t have much size, but Vincent could have scored on a lot of post players with what he showed. It’s enough to make you wonder why he didn’t do it more often.
• Anyone watching Drexel hold off Towson surely noticed Dartaye Ruffin’s struggles at the foul line late. He took four free throws in the final minutes and missed all of them badly, including a couple of airballs. Ruffin, who hurt his shoulder earlier in the week, finished just shy of a double-double with eight points and 12 rebounds, helping the Dragons to a commanding 43-26 edge on the glass.
• A formula for success for Northeastern included the starting perimeter trio of Chaisson Allen, Jonathan Lee and Joel Smith all scoring in double figures. That happened on Friday, but the Huskies lost for the fourth time when they did that. They were 8-4 in those games.
• Jawan Carter didn’t get much help from the complementary players in the first half, but got plenty in the second half and it made all the difference for Delaware. Devon Saddler and D.J. Boney combined for 20 points in the latter frame, with Saddler making a big three-pointer from the left wing that put the Blue Hens ahead for good with less than three minutes to play.
• Delaware isn’t known for their offense, but the Blue Hens had a pretty good night on Friday. They shot 51.2 percent from the field, including 7-14 from long range.
• One stat that can get lost easily in William & Mary’s win is what Kendrix Brown did. The junior guard has been in and out of the starting lineup this season as he has had his struggles, but he’s played better of late and was a key on Saturday night. He had eight points and four assists, but more importantly, nine rebounds, and none bigger than two that he grabbed in traffic in the final minutes.”Kendrix is a great example of this team,” said head coach Tony Shaver. “His resurgence has been one of the real keys to our last month of basketball. He doesn’t do a lot offensively in the scoring column, but he had four assists and one turnover tonight, and he had nine man-rebounds tonight. Every one of them was a big rebound.”
• Both James Madison and William & Mary had more than 20 made field goals but a single digit number of assists.

After steadily improving the win totals and finishing with high seeds, Allen’s Northeastern Huskies finished tenth in the CAA this season. They lost 20 games a year after they won 20. Wins were hard to come by early, and later on they struggled closing out games. They lost a number of close games, and also blew leads in a couple of games that would have been nice wins to raise the young team’s confidence. Yet he has never shown a sign that it has been difficult on him. He knew what this season would be like, and he’s taken the ups and downs in stride all along.

Still, it was a tough way to end a career, indeed, especially considering it’s one that’s seen Allen come a long way.

Allen received his share of accolades this season. He repeated as a first team All-CAA selection, a year after he was runner-up for Player of the Year. He made the All-Defensive team. He’s been lauded often by his coach and teammates as a quietly good leader, a young man who hasn’t exactly embraced the spotlight but not in a bad way. He finishes his career with over 1,500 points, good for ninth on the school’s all-time scoring list. And he would trade all of that in for a chance to go to the NCAA Tournament.

When Allen first came to Huntington Ave, the thought was he could be a four-year starter. He had good size to play both guard spots, but a lot of instincts for the point. He joined a team that had plenty of youth at the time, but potential wasn’t lacking if the unit could grow together. They did, and the Huskies were a force in the CAA for a couple of years. This year was a different story.

Allen is a level-headed young man from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, the youngest of three children in a warm and friendly family. He’s been playing basketball since the age of four, and it seemed like that was destined to be his sport even though he had others in his life. As a youngster, he also played baseball and football, even playing on a travel team with the former for a time. While he was good at both, the hardwood was the ultimate calling, and interestingly, it was a now fellow CAA coach who saw that at a young age.

Back when Buzz Peterson was the head coach at Tennessee, where one of his older brothers played football, Allen attended a basketball camp there. Peterson saw him, and being the lifelong basketball man that he is, had a sense. He figured Allen was going to grow into having guard size and perhaps be a point guard. If you weren’t sure whether or not Peterson knows something about basketball, this should convince you. The last four years have, although Peterson only saw it up close this year as he’s in his first season at CAA rival UNC Wilmington.

The point guard spot came naturally to Allen for a few reasons. One was apparent right away as a college player: he plays with a quiet confidence and never looks rattled. A team’s floor leader needs that because teammates will watch the body language of their leader. It’s something that one player who has grown while playing alongside him noticed.

“At the opening of the game, he’s composed, late in the game he’s composed, and he’s always been a factor,” said sophomore guard Jonathan Lee, Allen’s most likely successor at the point.

That leads to the other chief reason the point guard spot seemed to be the natural position for him. Allen has always been about his teammates. When he was younger and his team would get up big, and they would bring in kids who hardly ever played, he would draw a double or triple team while motioning for one of those players to get near the basket. He would hit him with a pass for a layup, and that would make everyone’s day. It’s like in college when a walk-on comes in and scores.

It hasn’t ended there, either, and his likely successor has seen that, too.

“He’s often talking in my ear, saying, ‘You take it,’ ‘You get it,’ encouraging me,” said Lee, who has grown immensely as a sophomore after playing very limited minutes as a freshman last season.

Since coming to Northeastern, Allen has improved every year. The most noticeable example of his work can be seen in his jump shot, which was just about non-existent when he first came to Huntington Ave. What passed for a jump shot was little more than a set shot, as he barely got off the ground, and not surprisingly, he didn’t shoot well although he also didn’t take a lot of them. He came back as a sophomore with a more natural stroke, getting more lift as well. The numbers weren’t there, but the stage was set for another off-season where he spent a lot of time putting up shots, and for his last two seasons he’s shot the ball very well, especially from long range.

In an age when a lot of players repeat a year of high school along the way and enter college a little older, Allen is a very young man. While it hasn’t been uncommon in recent years to see a freshman at age 20 before playing a minute of college basketball, Allen’s career is over and he won’t turn 22 for three more months. He came to the school ready to grow as a young man, and he’s done that. As he looks to play professional basketball, he has growth left in him at this young age. The NBA is a long shot, but there are sure to be other opportunities.

Whereas one older brother, Mikki, played his college ball at nearby Tennessee, Chaisson went away for school. His parents have managed to make a lot of his games over his career despite the distance from home, so they have been able to share in some of the experience. Allen has enjoyed his time at the school and the players and students he has been around, and his father speaks highly of it as well. A parent never knows what to expect when a child goes far away from home for school, but it’s fair to say there are no disappointments in this story.

Things are all set to end well off the court as he works to finish his degree this spring. In a different world, they might have ended a little better on the court. In a different world, Chaisson Allen’s career would have had the ending you would think his career deserves.