It was all finally starting to come together for the Massachusetts men’s basketball team. After a tough five-game losing streak that saw the Minutemen fall below .500 for the first time under Steve Lappas, they rebounded to run off three straight Atlantic 10 wins to forge their way back toward the top of the standings.
But then Dayton came rolling into the Mullins Center and UMass seemed to take a step back, falling 83-68 to the Flyers on Wednesday night. The Maroon and White looked flat on both ends of the court and didn’t have the same jump in its step that it showed in its wins over Temple, George Washington and St. Bonaventure.
The Minutemen (9-9, 3-4 A-10) will look to get back on track as they head to Kingston, R.I. on Saturday afternoon to take on the University of Rhode Island at the Keaney Gymnasium. This will be the first time since the 1991-92 season that these two conference foes have battled in the Ocean State but not at the Providence Civic Center.
This marks the start of a three-game stretch in which the Maroon and White take on a triumvirate of teams that have combined for just two conference wins among them. It is also a stretch that will see the club without the services of junior forward Micah Brand. Brand, the team’s second-leading scorer, went down early in the first half of the Dayton game with a severely sprained ankle. He returned briefly midway through the first half but saw no action with the Minutemen well behind in the final 20 minutes. Brand will definitely not see action on Saturday against the Rams, but just how long he will be unavailable is yet to be determined.
“It’s not broken, but it’s a bad sprain,” Lappas said of the ankle. “Right now we don’t know how long he will be out, could be one game, could be four games.”
Another problem that Brand’s injury creates is who will match up defensively with URI’s Troy Wiley. Wiley, a junior college transfer was named co-A-10 Player of the Week for his performances against Xavier and GW. He averaged 21.5 points per game in those two contests and gives the Rams their only legitimate inside option.
“We have to scramble now with Micah out,” Lappas said. “We don’t know who it will be [guarding Wiley], it could be Eric [Williams], could be Raheim [Lamb] or it could be Kit [Rhymer].”
Whether he is called upon to stop Wiley or not, Rhymer will be looking for a repeat performance of the last time he locked horns with the Rams. On Feb. 20 of last year, Rhymer exploded for a career high 30 points, grabbed six boards and blocked five shots, leading the Minutemen to an 82-67 win at the Mullins Center. With the Rams only having three players on their roster listed at 6-foot-7 or bigger and only two weighing more than 200 pounds, the chance for Rhymer to do some serious damage on Saturday afternoon is there.
But despite URI’s lack of size on the interior, most opponents have been able to beat them from the perimeter. The Rams are giving up an average of eight trifectas per contest and opponents are hitting almost 37 percent from behind the arc.
This should come as good news to the Minutemen, especially their three guards: Shannon Crooks, Anthony Anderson and Kyle Wilson. In the last four games, those three have hit 33-of-68 from three-point range and have provided more than 50 percent of the UMass offense over that period.
“We’ve been taking a lot of threes lately,” Lappas said. “But all three of those guys have shot the ball well. Even Brennan Martin is shooting the ball much better.”
In the end though the key will be defense. If the Minutemen can play well on the defensive end and they play within themselves at the other end of the floor, they will win. UMass is 9-0 this season when opponents shoot 37-percent or below. If they can hold the Rams below that mark the Minutemen should be well on their way to their fourth A-10 victory of the season.
