The Massachusetts men’s basketball team fought hard in its 73-71 loss to Saint Louis on Tuesday. The Minutemen (10-13, 5-5 Atlantic 10) displayed their identity emphatically on the court despite the undesired result.
“The grit that this team has embraced for us to become a good basketball team, you obviously saw it today,” head coach Frank Martin said. “We’ve created a personality of how we have to play to win games.”
The Minutemen grabbed 21 offensive rebounds against the Billikens (14-9, 7-3 A-10), the most in a single game for UMass since Jan. 30, 2019 against La Salle. UMass showed pride in controlling the boards on both ends in the game, and one particular sequence spoke to that.
With UMass up by three with just over 1:30 to go in the game, Isaiah Swope missed a game-tying three and Daniel Rivera went sky-high to rip the board down. As the packed Mullins Center crowd cheered for the effort, Rivera missed an attempt at a coast-to-coast finish, but Jayden Ndjigue flew in at full speed to get the offensive board.
Ndjigue rocketed the ball to an open Jaylen Curry beyond the arc, resulting in another shot careening off the rim and into the arms of Rivera. The junior forward got fouled pulling down that board and hit a pair of free throws to put the Minutemen up by five with 1:17 left.
Though the events that followed weren’t favorable to the home squad, this chain of plays showed an undeniable effort by UMass to outwork its opponent on the glass.
“[Martin’s] team [is] so tough, so physical. [I] thought they beat us up in a lot of ways.” St. Louis head coach Josh Schertz said. “We’ve played some really good teams this year, that’s the most physical team we’ve played all year.”
Along with their focused rebounding attack, the Minutemen showed an abundance of physicality on the defensive end, which resulted in a flood of turnovers by St. Louis. The Billikens ended the game with 15 turnovers, something UMass took advantage of, scoring 20 points off its opponents’ mishaps.
The Minutemen have made transition offense a key part of team success throughout the year as Martin has noted that he likes his teams to play fast. With the team going 9-of-29 on layup attempts throughout the night, the most consistent option for UMass to get easy points was to run ahead of the defense.
This was characterized best by a 6-0 run through the midway point of the second half. To start, Marqui Worthy drew and hit a pair of free throws after a rim run in transition. Then Ndjigue missed a layup, but Rivera was there to get the board. The junior forward missed a short hook, but corralled his own rebound after a near five-second volley and finally got a shot to drop.
On the next possession, Worthy grabbed a defensive rebound and hustled his way across half-court, finding Ndjigue running ahead of him for an uncontested pair of points. This gave the Minutemen their largest lead of the game at nine, resulting in a St. Louis timeout.
“We didn’t deviate from [taking layups] even though we weren’t making shots, which allowed us to defend,” Martin said. “We started to rebound, which allowed us to run, but we got tentative there at the end of the game.”
Though the final moments didn’t fall in the favor of UMass, there is no doubt that Martin’s team competed in the way it was designed to. The overlay of defense and rebounding leading to explosive transition offense has become a staple to this Minutemen team and proved to bring success when the team was fully focused.
UMass will look to break a two-game slide against La Salle on Sunday, Feb. 9 at 2 p.m. That game will be available to watch on USA Network.
Tym Brown can be reached at [email protected] and followed on X @tym_brown1.