Game Recap: Friars Blow a 17-Point Halftime Lead to Lose to Long Beach State 66-65

On By The Morning HangoverIn Basketball Game Recaps, PC Men's Basketball

Providence Friars (4-3) 65

Long Beach State 49ers (3-4) 66

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You can forgive the losses to Northwestern, a power conference team, and Penn, who in actuality is pretty good, but Long Beach State?  That’s when you have yourself a problem.  That’s a loss that is going to be a stain on any resume once tournament bids are being handed out.  The other two aren’t great losses either but they could turn out to not hurt so much depending how the seasons for those teams end up.

Even though Providence played a pretty sloppy first half of basketball, they still led by as much as 17-points based on their superior size and talent alone.  Then everything went to hell.  The tides turned with only 16 minutes of game to play and Long Beach just outplayed Providence to win the first round of the Wooden Legacy tournament in Anaheim.

The Friars started the game playing directly into the 49ers hands, settling for bombing threes, with 6 of their first 9 shots coming from deep.  The Friars ended up hitting 1/3 of their shots from three, going 8-24 from distance.  The main culprit for the game, and for the season, was once again Luwane Pipkins, who jacked up 10 threes, connecting on 3.  Pip shot twice as many threes as any other player on the team.

Unlike the Friars, the 49ers continued to attack the rim, only shooting 10 threes for the game.  Granted, that might be partly because they only shot 2-10, but they finished the game shooting 47.2% from the floor.  The Friars turned Long Beach over like they’ve been known to do this season (18 TOs) but counter-acted that with their own severe turnover problems, coughing it up 21 times.  I continue to say, that in order to be successful, the Friars need to at the very least finish the game with more assists than turnovers.  Providence ended the game with 18 assists and 21 turnovers.  There you go.

Game Notes: 

  • Alpha Diallo finished his 4th straight game short of a double-double after starting the season with 3 straight.  Diallo notched 11 points, 9 rebounds, 5 steals, and 4 assists.  Of course, Alpha also turned the ball over 4 times, marking the 6th time in 7 games where he has turned it over at least 4 times.
  • Duke had his first game with turnover trouble as well, coughing the ball up a team-high 5 times.  Duke had taken great care of the rock leading up to this game, only turning the ball over 6 times over 6 games.  He was able to stuff the rest of the stat sheet per usual, getting himself 9 points, 4 rebounds, 4 assists, and a pair of steals.
  • Pipkins needs to stop shooting so many threes, like for real.
  • Luwane actually ended up leading the Friars in scoring with 12, but it took him 13 shots to get there.  You should never, ever, EVER, have more field goal attempts than points.
  • Pip continues to dish out assists, notching a team-high 5, but his growing pile of three-point brick sure feel like turnovers in an of themselves.  Pipkins has recorded 5 or more assists in 6 of the 7 games this season.
  • LP is still always on the money with the alley-oop connections.
  • Greg Gantt needs more minutes.  He preforms whenever he is on the court.  In just 12 minutes, he scored 6 points, grabbed 4 rebounds and a block.
  • Big Nate looked pretty good but still needs to get his wind back in time.
  • A.J. Reeves and Emmitt Holt all looked pretty good…besides Emmitt fouling on the three-point shot at the end of the game, however slight that call was.
  • Maliek White was a little chilly from three, going 1-5 and turned the ball over 3 times.
  • The point guards collectively did not put together a good night of basketball, recording 12 turnovers to 9 assists, shooting 10-31 from the floor and 5-18 from three.
  • Kalif didn’t get much run in this one, which is a little surprising based on the size advantage the Friars had.

Next Game, the Friars head to the loser’s bracket tomorrow to face the College of Charleston.

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