UMass basketball falls hard in 2nd half at VCU
Published: 01-17-2023 10:06 PM |
The second half rolled away from the UMass men’s basketball team and snowballed against VCU at the Siegel Center on Tuesday.
UMass fell 83-55, as it was outscored 43-22 after halftime in Richmond, Va. It was the Minutemen’s worst-ever loss against the Rams, which shot 8-for-16 from 3 and forced 16 turnovers, leading to 16 points.
“The emotion of the building disrupted our team,” UMass coach Frank Martin said. “We lost our discipline and our attention to detail.”
The Rams’ previous largest margin of victory was 18 points on Jan 19, 2019.
UMass didn’t hit a field goal for the final 2 minutes, 25 seconds and missed six of its last seven shots.
The Minutemen kept pace for the first 18 minutes. Rahsool Diggins gave UMass a 33-31 advantage with 3:50 left after sinking a driving layup. The Rams then ripped off a 9-0 run to end the first half that stretched to 11-0 in the first 17 seconds of the second half.
They kept Rams leading scorer Ace Baldwin in check with just two points, but the rest of VCU’s roster did the damage for him. Five VCU players reached double figures led by Jalen Deloach’s 19.
VCU (14-5, 5-1 Atlantic 10) led by as many as 29 points and remained undefeated against UMass at the Siegel Center. The Minutemen have never won at VCU in five trips across 10 years. UMass is 1-6 in its last seven matchups with the Rams.
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Matt Cross led UMass (11-7, 2-4) with 15 points and 10 rebounds in a double-double. Dyondre Dominguez scored 10 points off the bench in the first half.
The Minutemen shot just 29.2 percent – 16 percent from 3. They didn’t hit a triple in the second half (0-for-11).
“We couldn’t make a shot in the second half. It broke our spirit, and we let go of the rope,” Martin said.