Brown has lost one big man, but regained the services of another. Mark MacDonald returned to the team after spending the past month away from the team, while Nate Eads has left the program for the proverbial personal reasons. MacDonald started the first three games of the season for the Bears, but was injured in the Providence game on November 18 and didn’t play after that, leaving the team in late December. The senior Eads had played in Brown’s first 17 games, starting 13 and playing 20.6 minutes per game, averaging 5.6 points and 2.2 rebounds per contest.

Slant: Losing one forward and getting back another might seem like six of one and a half-dozen of the other, but these are fairly different players. Eads is a strong, physical low-post player who added toughness inside, while MacDonald is much more of a finesse player, at home out on the perimeter taking three-pointers. The tradeoff not going to help Brown’s interior defense and weak rebounding, but it can make a decent three-pointer shooting team better. Freshman Matt Mullery also figures to benefit from additional playing time in the frontcourt.