The 2020-21 Monmouth University Basketball season begins on Wednesday, Nov. 25 with the women’s team away against Rutgers and the men’s team at home against Hofstra.
The women’s team, led by Head Coach Jody Craig, will face the Scarlet Knights for the first time since 1986, with a game scheduled for 11 a.m. Rutgers is led by redshirt senior guard Arella Guirantes, who was selected as Preseason Big Ten Co-Player of the Year and to the Naismith Trophy Watch List for National Player of the Year. During their non-conference slate, the women’s team is scheduled to compete against Sacred Heart, La Salle, Saint Joseph’s, and Drexel.
The men’s team opens the season hosting last year’s CAA champion Hofstra at 7 p.m. on the opening night of college basketball across the country. The Hawks then travel to defending Big Ten regular season champion University of Maryland on Dec. 1, marking the third time Head Coach King Rice has taken his team to play the Terps in his tenure at Monmouth. The non-conference schedule for the men’s team wraps up against the St. Francis Brooklyn Terriers on Dec. 4.
For the sixth straight season, all home basketball games will air on the ESPN Family of Networks, with the men listed for three opportunities to be flexed to ESPNU with a fourth already solidified to air on the linear platform. Monmouth’s men’s basketball road radio broadcasts will introduce a new look this season as well, with games now airing on MonmouthHawks.com via the Monmouth Digital Network.
This season’s broadcasts will feature two familiar names and also welcome in two new ones to the Monmouth Digital Network team. Eddy Occhipinti ’06, the ‘Voice of the Hawks,’ will again handle the primary play-by-play duties for the season, including men’s games on both ESPN and the Monmouth Digital Network radio broadcasts. Former Hawk Steve Bazaz ’07 will again serve as the primary analyst for the men’s broadcasts.
Assisting this season with the broadcasts of Monmouth women’s basketball home games on ESPN will be Cody Chrusciel and Dei Lynam. Chrusciel, the assistant director of athletics for multimedia and broadcasting at Princeton University, handles play-by-play for Princeton football and men’s lacrosse and will be provide play-by-play for the women’s broadcasts. Lynam has worked in the broadcast industry for 27 years most notably as an executive producer for NBA Entertainment, sports anchor, sideline reporter, analyst and radio host. For 20 years she was a fixture with the Philadelphia 76ers as a sideline reporter for Comcast Sportsnet Philadelphia and will be the analyst for the Monmouth women’s broadcasts.
Up-to-date regular season schedules for both teams are available at monmouthhawks.com