WALTHAM, Mass. – With a little more than a week until the season-opening Bentley Tip-Off Tournament Nov. 13-14, Bentley University men's basketball coach Jay Lawson will put his team to a preseason test Thursday night when the Falcons play an exhibition game at Boston College. Tip-off is set for 6 pm at Conte Forum with no admission being charged.

Bentley, coming off a 15-12 season, features the tandem of senior forward Tyler McFarland (Rockport, Maine/Camden Hills HS) and grad student Keegan Hyland (South Portland, Maine/South Portland HS), a duo combined to provide about 38 points and 14 rebounds a game last winter.

The six-foot-five McFarland, twice a second-team All-Northeast-10 selection, will enter his final season with 1,440 career points, a total that ranks 18th in program history. He's the first Bentley player to lead the team in scoring and rebounds each of his first three seasons and owns career shooting percentages of .499 overall, .469 from deep and .858 at the line.

Hyland, whose 19.0 scoring average was just a tenth of a point back of McFarland last year, has produced 16.2 ppg during his first 47 career games. He also contributed 6.9 rebounds, 3.6 assists and 1.1 steals last season while drilling 66 three-balls.

Three others who were regulars in last year's rotation are also back, including six-foot-six senior guard Alex Furness (Wells, Maine/Wells HS) who provided 9.3 points and 3.5 assists a game. Senior forward Shakir Phelps (Linden, N.J./Linden HS) is coming off a season that saw him score 6.7 a game and junior guard Ferguson Duke (Dartmouth, N.S./Hun School, N.J.) produced 5.7 ppg.

Junior guard Matt Barr (Stratham, N.H./Cushing Academy) will be vying for increased playing time after being hampered by injury last year, and a trio of promising newcomers – guard Ryan Richmond (Toronto, Ont./Thomson Collegiate) and forwards Kyle Bouchard (Houlton, Maine/Houlton HS) and Zachary Gilpin (Hampden, Maine/Hampden Academy) – will be looking to earn a spot in the rotation.

BC will have a significantly different look from last year's squad that finished 13-19. Seven-foot senior Dennis Clifford, who averaged 6.9 points, 5.5 rebounds and 1.2 blocks, is the only one of the top six scorers who is back.

Grad student Eli Carter has transferred in after scoring nearly nine a game last year for Florida and coach Jim Christian has added seven talented freshmen from around the country.

The Bentley Tip-Off Tournament will begin Nov. 13 with Bentley facing Concordia (N.Y.) and Merrimack taking on Caldwell. The following night, the two Northeast-10 teams will switch opponents.