SMITHFIELD, R.I. – In the fall of 2005, four young men arrived on the campus of Bryant University with a college basketball career in front of them. At the time, the program was in Division II, and a highly successful one at that. The four young men all roomed together right away, and as their journey draws to a close, they are now part of a Division I program. In light of that, it’s safe to say they’ve had quite the college experience.
“I’ve gotten to experience more transitions, I experienced two coaches,” said Andrew Lyell, who hails from Portsmouth, R.I. “I experienced more than most people did in their college career. We made it deep in the tournament in Division II, and I got to play some of the best teams in the country. So I got a little bit of everything.”
Although Lyell isn’t far from being a hometown kid (Portsmouth is about a half hour away from the Smithfield campus), he went away to Northfield Mount Hermon School for high school. He had some Division I interest, but nothing solid, and was happy to go to school closer to home with family and friends he grew up with.
Lyell remembers how he and the other seniors have been together all along. That’s undoubtedly one thing that has helped this first Division I team through a challenging transition that has seen results better than many expected. The Bulldogs have eight wins on the season, three coming right in a row on the road, and they have done this playing a full Division I schedule.
“I remember the first night, we all introduced ourselves and hung out that first night,” Lyell recalled. “From then on, it was smooth sailing.”
The other Rhode Islander in the class is Peter Lambert, who really blossomed as the season went along. Lambert is very much a hometown kid, hailing from nearby Cumberland, and although he had offers from Babson, Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Bentley, being close to his hometown and family was too big a draw to pass up, especially given Bryant’s academic reputation with its business school. He’ll continue to be close to home, having accepted a job in the fall at CCR in Providence.
Lambert, who initially joined the team as a walk-on, is third on the team in scoring and is shooting just under 34 percent from long range on the season. With one game left, he has nearly surpassed his point total for his first three seasons. He owns the school record for three-pointers in a game, making nine against Merrimack last January. But the real show of what he’s all about came a couple of nights before his last home game, and indeed it highlighted his classmates as well.
Head coach Tim O’Shea turned the scout for the Bulldogs’ game against NJIT over to his seniors. They enjoyed the experience, having seen what the staff does for scouts in prior games, and the result certainly was a good one as they blew out the Highlanders in their largest margin of victory on the season. As O’Shea recalled, Lambert led them out of the locker room before the game.
“Pete went over the personnel, like he was the coach,” O’Shea recalls. “After a while, he went over, erased it all and put a big heart up. He goes, ‘that’s all that matters,’ and they all started laughing and they all ran out of the locker room.”
Senior forward Ryan McLean’s sister Ashleigh went to Bryant, but he didn’t wind up at the school the usual way that a younger sibling does. His sister graduated right before he came on campus, and it turns out, had more than just a large role in him coming to Bryant. It wasn’t as simple as following in an older sibling’s footsteps, as often happens when siblings go to the same school.
“She actually is the reason I am here,” McLean, who grew up in Plymouth, Mass., said with a smile.
His sister saw Max Good, who was the head coach until last season, at a hotel in Maryland while the Bulldogs were playing Maryland. She asked if he needed a big man, and as it turned out, he did. That set in motion a late recruitment that led to him coming to Smithfield, all at a time when he wasn’t sure where he would wind up despite having some Division I interest from the likes of Lafayette and New Hampshire, along with plenty of Division II and III schools.
“I was starting to get nervous about where I was going to go, and that just happened to fall into my lap,” McLean reflected.
Of all the seniors, the simplest story might be that of the one non-New Englander, forward Jerann Wright. The 6’7″ forward liked the campus on his visit – his first one – and got a scholarship offer, and that made it the right choice. A native of Cincinnati, this experience gave him a chance to get away from home, and he was away from home all the way as his mother’s appearance at the game for Senior Night was the first time she got to see him play during his four years.
Wright, who steadily progressed during his senior season as a role player in the frontcourt, liked the business school and that also played a role in his decision. He’s looking forward to three interviews he has lined up near his hometown during spring break, and the management major appears to be well on his way to success after graduation.
The senior class had a major change in their last year in terms of bottom line success. They were a part of 60 wins in their first three years, but just eight this time around. Still, they were a major reason this season has been as successful as it has, and that’s not lost on their leader.
“I really thanked them. I really credited them for hanging in there and fighting,” O’Shea said. “We’ve got eight wins now, and I don’t know if anybody really expected us to get eight this year. I think there was a lot of doubt as to whether we would get any.”
Not only did they get eight wins, but three came on the road in succession. They also won on Tuesday with the seniors doing the scout. The seniors are closing in on the end of a college experience that has seen a lot, and as was the case when they came in, they’re doing it all together.
