The University of Rhode Island men’s basketball team dropped its final regular-season game at Fordham University, heading into the Atlantic 10 Tournament as the No. 10 seed.
Fordham was celebrating its senior day, honoring five players in its 61-49 victory.
Despite leading after the first half, the Rams’ offense hit a wall in the second half, shooting 7-26 from the field and 2-14 from beyond the arc.
Three minutes into the first half, third-year wing Jahmere Tripp responded to a Fordham three-pointer with Rhody’s first triple of the day to go back up by three.
Fordham went scoreless for over six minutes, where fourth-year guard Jonah Hinton and Tripp both hit three-pointers, taking a 17-8 lead. A Tripp three-point play put the Rams up by double digits with under eight minutes remaining in the half.
After Fordham knocked down a three, Tripp hit his third triple of the half, going back up by 10 points. Following this, Rhody allowed Fordham to go on a 10-0 scoring run, tying the contest up 23-23.
Seventh-year guard Tyler Cochran broke Rhody’s scoreless streak by knocking down a three-pointer, and a buzzer-beater jump shot by sixth-year guard RJ Johnson ended the half on a high note.
Cochran’s steal one minute into the second half forced a Fordham foul, and Hinton converted both shots from the charity stripe. Back-and-forth scoring action continued in the half’s first five minutes, featuring Tripp’s fourth triple.
With a layup by third-year forward Rikus Schulte and a jumper by fifth-year guard Dejour Reaves, Fordham took its first lead since the opening minute of the contest.
Cochran hit a three-pointer followed by a layup to retake the lead 40-39 momentarily, but it was all Fordham from that point on. Fordham outscored Rhody 21-9 in the final 10 minutes of the half.
Reaves and Schulte led Fordham with a combined 31 points. Schulte also recorded a double-double, notching 13 rebounds. Fordham’s bench scored 20 points in comparison to URI’s four points.
“[Fordham Head Coach Mike Magpayo] was showing us how he’ll go all above for the team, so we just had to match his intensity,” Reaves said. “So now we have to go out there and play extra hard for him because he’s willing to risk it all for us, and that fire showed today.”
Tripp led the Rams with 18 points, followed by Cochran with 12. Cochran added four steals on his season, making him three steals short of the single-season record of 88, which was set by Tom Garrick ’90.
“We stuck to our process; it was a lot of fundamental defense,” Magpayo said. “We were committed to it all game long today. They stuck with it when they got hit off some threes from Tripp, who is a great player. But then I really felt like we suffocated them in the second half.”
With the loss, the Rams finish 7-11 in conference play, while staying just above .500 in their overall record of 16-15.
Rhody will take on the No. 7-seeded Duquesne University on Thursday at 5 p.m. in Pittsburgh in the A-10 Tournament’s second round. URI took down the Dukes 64-52 on March 4 at the Ryan Center. The game will be broadcast on USA Network and available on the radio on The Varsity Network.
