AMHERST – At his weekly radio show on Monday night, Massachusetts men’s basketball coach Steve Lappas said that he wanted his Minutemen to keep the score against St. Bonaventure in the 60’s. If they did so Lappas felt that his squad would be able to knock off the high-flying Bonnies for the second time this season.
Less than a month ago the Minutemen handed St. Bonaventure its first home loss of the 67-65 on a Micah Brand dunk with less than 10 seconds remaining.
However there would be no such heroics last night as J.R. Bremer scored 31 points and Marques Green added 19 to give the Bonnies a 60-56 victory at the Mullins Center.
Bremer and Green were the offense for the Bonnies as the rest of the team managed just a paltry 10 points on 2-of-15 shooting. However it was enough as Anthony Anderson was unable to inbound the ball with 17.6 seconds left and UMass down by three. Bremer then hit one of two free throws a few seconds later to put the game away.
“Everybody feels down right now,” said sophomore forward Raheim Lamb. “We had a chance to win and we just gave away the game.”
Bremer hit 10-of-19 shots and 9-of-11 free throws en route to 31 points, marking the seventh time this season that he has scored 30 or more.
Lamb led the Minutemen with a career high 18 points but the inside trio of Brand, Kitwana Rhymer and Eric Williams managed just eight points and 13 boards against the much smaller Bonnies. Brand was the main culprit as he grabbed just two rebounds before picking up his fourth and fifth fouls at the 11:47 mark of the second half. Brand fouled Bremer on a layup and was then whistled for a technical foul immediately following the play for his fifth of the night. With Brand on the bench Lappas was forced to go to a smaller lineup thus negating his squad interior advantage. With Brand out for most of the second half SBU was able to grab a 32-30 rebounding edge including 12-7 on the offensive glass.
The Bonnies came into the game averaging more than 80 points per game and led the nation in three-pointers made. However, they scored a season low 60 points shot 35-percent from the floor and made just four-of-21 three-pointers.
But one of those three’s was one of the biggest baskets of the game. Senior forward Vidal Massiah knocked down a three off an inbound pass with just one second left on the shot clock to give the Bonnies a 31-29 lead for his only points of the game.
In the end it was turnovers that killed the Minutemen as they gave the ball over 18 times including twice in the final 90 seconds when they had the ball in the offensive end with a chance to tie. With UMass down by two Shannon Crooks (13 points) tried to fire a pass into the lane to a slashing Rhymer, only for the 5-foot-7 Green to step into the passing lane and grab his game-high sixth steal.
Less than a minute later UMass once again had a chance to tie after Crooks tied up Green in front of the Minuteman bench giving the ball back to UMass. However, Anderson could not get the ball inbounds giving the ball back to the Bonnies who put the game away at the free throw line.
