NECC Observer

The student news website of Northern Essex Community College, Haverhill and Lawrence, Mass.

The Knights are road warriors

All of the NECC Knights basketball team’s losses have been at home, while they have gone undefeated during away games with a record of 4-0.

The Knight’s season started off on the road for 2 games, with an opener at NHTI and a game two days later at Great Bay.

At NHTI, the Knights posted a 91-68 score to win their first game of the season. Matthew Jameson led the scoring with 18 points. Andres Hernandez scored 17 points and Dominic Dar scored 13. NECC hit 50 percent of their 3-point attempts and racked up 51 rebounds, 14 of them came from Jonathan Paulino.

Two days later, the Knights arrived in Great Bay and brought their best game, winning 105-55. It was a very impressive early season win. They scored 59 points in the 1st half alone. Dar scored 14 and Paulino kept the rebound train chugging with 15 on the game.

The early road wins put NECC in a good position to keep their record moving up and have made a good foundation for later in the season.

Knights player Julio Vicente spoke about the team doing well on the road.

“I think we’re good on the road … I feel like my team is more focused when we are on our way over to the games. I just put some headphones on and I zone out.”

The Knights’ next road game was on Nov. 19 at Bristol. Coach Darren Stratton was suspended from NECC two games beforehand, so assistant coach Joe Tardif took the reins and led the Knights to their third road win of the season at Bristol. NECC won 101-93.

The Bristol game was a closer score than the other road games. The Knights scored 53 of their points in the first half. Paulino had 14 rebounds on the game. Jameson and Dar scored 22 and 23 points respectively. The scoring was more well rounded this game, with everyone getting a piece of the 101 points.

NECC’s most recent road game was at Quinsigamond, where they won 81-70 in their closest road win of the season so far. Jameson continued his domination and scored 24 points, with the next closest point-getter being Bryan Morales, who scored 16 points.

The Knights have four road games coming in December.