Donte Clark gave the Massachusetts men’s basketball team a second chance to snap its six-game losing streak.
It didn’t matter.
UMass (8-12, I-7 Atlantic 10) dropped its seventh straight game Saturday afternoon, falling to Fordham 78-72 in overtime, as the Minutemen have not won a game since Jan. 3. Their last seven-losing streak was in the 2003-04 season.
Christian Sengfelder provided the dagger, drilling a corner 3-pointer in front of the Rams (12-8. 3-6 A-10) bench with 52 seconds remaining in overtime to give Fordham a 72-67 lead, putting the game out of reach for UMass.
“I think we just didn’t make enough good basketball plays to win a game. They made some plays and we didn’t,” Minutemen coach Derek Kellogg said.
“I think we’re playing hard enough to win at times and compete at a pretty good clip, but I think we just have to play better basketball at different junctures of the game.”
The game would have ended in regulation but Clark drilled a 3-pointer in front of the UMass bench after Trey Davis drove into the lane to find an open Clark with 8.8 seconds remaining.
The Minutemen had just 11 field goal makes in the second half and overtime after Antwan Space made a buzzer-beating three-quarter-court shot at the end of the first half to tie the game at 32.
With Fordham’s top two players – Ryan Rhoomes and Mandell Thomas – combining for just 15 points, the Rams received solid contributions from Joseph Chartouny, who finished with 18 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists. David Pekarek, who averaged three points per game entering Saturday finished with 11 points including three made 3-pointers.
Both teams spent most of the day at the free throw line as UMass went 21-for-30 from the line while the Rams finished 21-for-31. Fordham attacked the Minutemen’s interior all game after Clark and Davis had been playing with four fouls for the last 4:56 of the game.
“There are different types of teams in the Atlantic 10. There are many shot blockers in the Atlantic 10 and we’ve seen those teams and they’re hard to attack. UMass is not a shot-blocking team,” Rams coach Jeff Neubauer said.
He added: “They were also switching some screens, so we had some good matchups at times. We absolutely wanted to attack them. Our mentality coming in was we had to get some buckets at the rim at some point. Our guys did a good job down the stretch of getting those baskets.”
Davis led all UMass scorers with 21 points, shooting 12-of-14 from the foul line despite a dismal 4-of-13 from the field. After a slow start, Clark finished with 19 points.
The Minutemen held a 59-58 lead with 1:40 remaining after a pair of Davis’ free throws, but the Rams answered two possessions later when Thomas converted a layup with 47 seconds to go to regain the lead.
Fordham led by as many as 10 after a 11-2 run with 7:44 remaining in the first half, but UMass countered with an 11-0 run of its own over the next 3:37 with baskets from Clark, Rashaan Holloway, C.J. Anderson and Seth Berger. In his second consecutive start Anderson led the Minutemen with 11 rebounds, the next closest being Antwan Space with six.
As a team UMass shot just 5-of-27 from the 3-point range with Clark, Davis and Jabarie Hinds combining to go 4-of-19. Hinds finished with just two points in 15 minutes off the bench.
“You can’t look down or look backwards, so I’m just going to continue moving forward and try to bring these guys along. Hopefully they’ll come along with me,” Davis said.
Andrew Cyr can be reached at [email protected], and followed on Twitter @Andrew_Cyr.
