"This will be our ninth Atlantic Ten game and our sixth on the road," Giannini said, referring to the GW contest.
"It's a little unusual. To do this was a heckuva challenge. I just wish we would have won some more. But I think we'll put together a strong stretch shortly. We're going to work through it before all is said and done."
The Explorers are going to reverse fortune without junior forward Yves Mekongo Mbala, their top rebounder and third-leading scorer, who suffered a broken bone in his right hand in last week's last-second home loss to Dayton.
"We weren't sure it was broken until X-rays the next day," Giannini said. "I'm not sure he remembers the play when it happened. He's a great kid and we'll miss him, but we have enough players where others can step up to the challenge."
Sophomore Jerrell Williams will start in Mbala's place, and senior Paul Johnson will see more minutes off the bench, Giannini said.
Tidbits
It was a good-news, bad-news day last Thursday for Mbala. On the same day he learned he had a broken bone in his hand, which ended his string of consecutive starts at 60, the Integrated Science/Business Technology major was named to the ESPN The Magazine academic all-District team for District 2.
The Explorers have played four teams now ranked in the RPI Top 20 - Connecticut (4), Xavier (5), Villanova (13) and Florida State (20) - and two more in the top 50 - Dayton (32) and Temple (45). They are 0-6 in those games. Their strength of schedule as of yesterday was 80, better than that of Marquette, Florida and Butler.
