Boston College Athletics
Photo by: Eddie Shabomardenly
From "Fall Back" to "Basketball's Back"
November 04, 2024 | Men's Basketball, #ForBoston Files
Daylight Savings Time yields an extra hour to stay up and watch the Eagles vs. The Citadel
CHESTNUT HILL, Mass. -- I was never one to wade into the debate over Daylight Savings Time.Â
Gaining or losing an hour of sleep never impacted my approach to any given day. My offices seldom leaked sunlight into windowless rooms, so timing wakeups or commutes weren't exposed to the early evening sunsets or late morning sunrises. Outdoor runs didn't include those Rocky-like montages involving emptied streets, and basement gyms weren't subject to outdoor elements anyways.
Having children changed the whole dynamic of dealing with cranky and ruined routines, so dealing with Daylight Savings Time is more of a grind stretching 24-to-48 hours of nerve-wracking intensity than ever before. The extra hour of sleep doesn't exist for three-year olds, and staying up late versus going to bed early is an adjustment period built into the ever-established household fiefdom.
More than anything, I awoke on Monday morning to the realization that one extra hour pushed the start of college basketball season. The best time of year, the Christmas morning, the daylong festival built around American hardwoods, it all needed to wait an extra hour while Massachusetts repeated 2 a.m. on Sunday night. Yet the long wait, the arduous and temperate climb up the mountain, finally appeared after the kids were off to school.Â
Basketball season was, finally, back.
"As you climb a mountain, the mountain don't care," said head coach Earl Grant in his most often-used message. "That mountain can't talk to you, so we've been climbing the mountain since Day One. We're not at the bottom where we were, but we're not at the top. We're somewhere in between, so we want to continue to climb. We want to look up and move the program to the next phase. That's our plan."
Boston College kicks off the 92nd stage of its basketball odyssey on Monday night, but its opponent from The Citadel is arriving at Conte Forum with many of the same questions surrounding the Eagles' first appearance. A 20-loss team from last season, the Bulldogs failed to win more than three games in a Southern Conference that survived the latest round of realignment with its membership fully intact.
The league once boasted Davidson and Appalachian State but found itself losing members to the CAA, Atlantic 10 and Conference USA during realignment periods in the mid-2010s. Even newer members at Charleston and Elon found their way to new leagues, and the reconfigured SoCon made additions in Mercer and Samford, which captured the conference crown a season ago after clinching the No. 1 seed with a 15-3 regular season record.Â
While The Citadel struggled in league play in 2023-24, the Bulldogs took the fight to Boston College when the Eagles made a visit to McAlister Field House on Nov. 10, 2023. BC escaped with a 75-71 victory, thanks to 14 points off the bench from Donald Hand Jr. But The Citadel is looking to change its fortunes in the SoCon, as head coach Ed Conroy detailed in a season preview earlier this summer.Â
"You want to be celebrating those wins in March," said Conroy, "so we're looking at everything. We're looking at hydration, sleep, mental wellness. We begin with the end in mind and backtrack through the year with what we need to do. Our practices are demanding and physical, and we want to play 'playoff basketball' in late September."
Conroy brought The Citadel to the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament during his first stint with the Bulldogs and won 20 games at the military institution in South Carolina before shifting to Tulane in its final four years in Conference USA and first season in the American Athletic Conference.  He returned to The Citadel after spending time with both Minnesota and Vanderbilt.
BC's personnel is obviously different for the first game, but opening night isn't going to change much about The Citadel's approach to gritty, primetime basketball. Senior John Adams, a Central Massachusetts native returning home, averaged just under nine rebounds alongside his 14.5 points per game, and fellow senior Cam Glover averaged 15.7 points with four assists per game in the backcourt while Brody Fox scored approximately 25 points per game while playing a frontcourt swing position last season.
None of those players, for what it's worth, were at The Citadel last year, and none played basketball at the Division I level before matriculating south through the transfer portal. Fox was a D3Hoops.com Fourth Team All-American at Wisconsin-Stout, while Adams centrally factored into WPI's 21-win team that narrowly missed the national tournament in Division III despite his 17 points in the NEWMAC postseason loss to Babson.
"I didn't look at [the portal] as free agency," said Grant, whose own team rebuilt its nucleus through the portal, "but I talked to Brad Stevens about it, and I talked to Wes Wilcox from Sacramento and Dave Telep from the Spurs...hey were very excited about the opportunity that we had. It's a great opportunity to make your team better, and I'll get a text from guys that a guy might be a good pickup or a trade…So there are positives with the transfer portal because you can build a team right away with older guys."
Tipoff for BC's 2024-25 lidlifter is set for 8 p.m., with television coverage available through the ACC Network Extra on ESPN's online family of Internet and mobile device apps.
Gaining or losing an hour of sleep never impacted my approach to any given day. My offices seldom leaked sunlight into windowless rooms, so timing wakeups or commutes weren't exposed to the early evening sunsets or late morning sunrises. Outdoor runs didn't include those Rocky-like montages involving emptied streets, and basement gyms weren't subject to outdoor elements anyways.
Having children changed the whole dynamic of dealing with cranky and ruined routines, so dealing with Daylight Savings Time is more of a grind stretching 24-to-48 hours of nerve-wracking intensity than ever before. The extra hour of sleep doesn't exist for three-year olds, and staying up late versus going to bed early is an adjustment period built into the ever-established household fiefdom.
More than anything, I awoke on Monday morning to the realization that one extra hour pushed the start of college basketball season. The best time of year, the Christmas morning, the daylong festival built around American hardwoods, it all needed to wait an extra hour while Massachusetts repeated 2 a.m. on Sunday night. Yet the long wait, the arduous and temperate climb up the mountain, finally appeared after the kids were off to school.Â
Basketball season was, finally, back.
"As you climb a mountain, the mountain don't care," said head coach Earl Grant in his most often-used message. "That mountain can't talk to you, so we've been climbing the mountain since Day One. We're not at the bottom where we were, but we're not at the top. We're somewhere in between, so we want to continue to climb. We want to look up and move the program to the next phase. That's our plan."
Boston College kicks off the 92nd stage of its basketball odyssey on Monday night, but its opponent from The Citadel is arriving at Conte Forum with many of the same questions surrounding the Eagles' first appearance. A 20-loss team from last season, the Bulldogs failed to win more than three games in a Southern Conference that survived the latest round of realignment with its membership fully intact.
The league once boasted Davidson and Appalachian State but found itself losing members to the CAA, Atlantic 10 and Conference USA during realignment periods in the mid-2010s. Even newer members at Charleston and Elon found their way to new leagues, and the reconfigured SoCon made additions in Mercer and Samford, which captured the conference crown a season ago after clinching the No. 1 seed with a 15-3 regular season record.Â
While The Citadel struggled in league play in 2023-24, the Bulldogs took the fight to Boston College when the Eagles made a visit to McAlister Field House on Nov. 10, 2023. BC escaped with a 75-71 victory, thanks to 14 points off the bench from Donald Hand Jr. But The Citadel is looking to change its fortunes in the SoCon, as head coach Ed Conroy detailed in a season preview earlier this summer.Â
"You want to be celebrating those wins in March," said Conroy, "so we're looking at everything. We're looking at hydration, sleep, mental wellness. We begin with the end in mind and backtrack through the year with what we need to do. Our practices are demanding and physical, and we want to play 'playoff basketball' in late September."
Conroy brought The Citadel to the CollegeInsider.com Postseason Tournament during his first stint with the Bulldogs and won 20 games at the military institution in South Carolina before shifting to Tulane in its final four years in Conference USA and first season in the American Athletic Conference.  He returned to The Citadel after spending time with both Minnesota and Vanderbilt.
BC's personnel is obviously different for the first game, but opening night isn't going to change much about The Citadel's approach to gritty, primetime basketball. Senior John Adams, a Central Massachusetts native returning home, averaged just under nine rebounds alongside his 14.5 points per game, and fellow senior Cam Glover averaged 15.7 points with four assists per game in the backcourt while Brody Fox scored approximately 25 points per game while playing a frontcourt swing position last season.
None of those players, for what it's worth, were at The Citadel last year, and none played basketball at the Division I level before matriculating south through the transfer portal. Fox was a D3Hoops.com Fourth Team All-American at Wisconsin-Stout, while Adams centrally factored into WPI's 21-win team that narrowly missed the national tournament in Division III despite his 17 points in the NEWMAC postseason loss to Babson.
"I didn't look at [the portal] as free agency," said Grant, whose own team rebuilt its nucleus through the portal, "but I talked to Brad Stevens about it, and I talked to Wes Wilcox from Sacramento and Dave Telep from the Spurs...hey were very excited about the opportunity that we had. It's a great opportunity to make your team better, and I'll get a text from guys that a guy might be a good pickup or a trade…So there are positives with the transfer portal because you can build a team right away with older guys."
Tipoff for BC's 2024-25 lidlifter is set for 8 p.m., with television coverage available through the ACC Network Extra on ESPN's online family of Internet and mobile device apps.
Players Mentioned
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/ Men's BasketballMonday, October 19
Monday, October 19
Monday, October 19
Monday, October 19
