Before every game, Troy Bell closes his chestnut brown eyes and lays down. It’s nap time for the Boston College standout point guard, a quick respite during which he can visualize things.

His jumper. His free throws. His defense. Everything positive. Good karma. There was one thing, though, that Bell never imagined visualizing. Losing. A lot.

Yet that’s the position the underachieving Eagles have found themselves in all year. And despite scoring at a better clip than last season, Bell, a junior, partially blames himself for BC’s 18-10 record and 7-8 Big East showing. The Eagles hope to salvage a .500 conference record in the regular-season-ending matchup against Syracuse on Sunday in the Carrier Dome (CBS, noon).

“We’re definitely surprised,” he said. “No one anticipated this happening to us. We have some younger players. You can never really predict in the present how things are going to go. I’m an older player, and part of it is my fault.”

Bell was, after all, Big East Preseason Player of the Year. His name dotted dozens of preseason All-America lists, and he came off a summer during which he scored 24 points in Team USA’s gold-medal victory in the 2001 FIBA World Championship for Young Men in Saitama, Japan.

Things changed, though. Seniors Kenny Harley, Xavier Singletary and Jonathan Beerbohm graduated, and Bell realized he would have to lead the young Eagles as much as he would show off his luster to NBA scouts.

He’s still the Troy Bell who scores at will and single-handedly breaks down a defense (see: 42 points vs. Iowa State earlier this season). He’s still the 6-foot-1, 183-pound mighty mite who can juke and jive like Iverson and shoot and score like Mike (see: 22.2-point-per game average).

But he’s not the Troy Bell who smiled last season, the ebullient, happy-go-lucky Minnesotan, sans “Fargo” accent.

Bell sounded subdued in a phone conversation earlier this week, despondent over the Eagles’ woes and unsure of his standing at BC. The Eagles are a long shot at best to make the NCAA Tournament. After last season, Bell figured, it was their right.

Now he knows it’s a privilege, one that will likely take the Eagles winning next week’s Big East Tournament.

“This is still a very important game Sunday,” he said. “We have aspirations of making it to the NCAA Tournament. That’s everybody’s goal. I don’t know what the committee’s thinking right now. Maybe if we could beat Syracuse it could open some eyes.”

Slow down for a second. The Orangemen (20-9, 9-6) are slumping, too, and some place them firmly on the bubble, especially after last night’s poor showing in a 67-61 loss to Villanova.

So this isn’t exactly Troy vs. Goliath. That was actually earlier in the season, when Bell dropped 26 points in an 88-78 loss to then-No. 1 Duke. Instead, this is Bell’s chance to find seams in the Orangemen’s zone and launch shot after net-swishing shot.

“We’re gonna have to shoot it well,” he said. “That’s gonna have to be the case. If we’re shooting well, it’ll be fun. But if we’re not shooting well … ”

He paused.

“I don’t know.”

The self-doubt caused by the Eagles’ inconsistencies this season is evident when Bell talks about the team. Still, he said, “I’ve gotten better. I know more, things like that. When you’re not winning the way everyone expects you to, though, it’s really tough. It’s hard to look good when your team is struggling, when the chemistry is not there.

“If we were winning it’d look like, ‘Wow, this guy’s having a great season.’ But … ”

He paused again. He didn’t finish his sentence.

And he’s left plenty more open-ended. Bell has complained this season about the referees and how they’re hesitant to call fouls on the players guarding him.

“We try not to worry about the refs, but I get hit a lot,” he said. “Especially on threes. They hit my elbow all the time. That’s why I’ll shoot an airball.

“Everything’s political.”

For however outspoken Bell can be, though, he remains mum on his future plans. Plenty, he said, will depend on what happens the rest of the season. If the Eagles make the NCAA Tournament, Bell said, he is more, much more, likely to stay another year on Chestnut Hill.

“I have to see how things end up,” he said. “Hopefully my team and myself can finish on a strong note. That’ll really help things.”

If not? Good question. Bell has been asked plenty of times, and he’ll likely plead the fifth until May, when underclassmen must declare for the NBA Draft.

Tough decision, no doubt. But Bell views it just like he does the rest of the Eagles’ season.

“We’ll have to see,” he said. “We’ll just wait and see.”

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Published on February 28, 2002 at 12:00 pm