UMass Boston men’s basketball coach Charlie Titus never likes to lose. A 97-69 loss last Saturday to Plymouth State College, however, particularly irked the long time UMB coach. It wasn’t the nearly 30-point margin of defeat, he said, but his players’ effort.
“I couldn’t even talk to them after the game because I was afraid I was going to say something that I would be sorry for.”
Titus was at a loss as to why his team came out flatter than it has in quite some time.
“We’ve worked hard all year, on a 2-3 zone. We’ve had 70 practices, a total of 210 hours of practices. And we come out and perform like that? I am very upset. There is no need for that. It’s mental; it’s here (pointing to his head). It’s not physical. And it wasn’t just one guy. It was four or five guys.”
UMB’s record, as of February 16, stood at a miserable 5-18 mark. The team has now lost 7 out of its last 8 games, and 10 out of the last 12. Any positive feelings from the big Worcester Polytechnic upset over two weeks ago are now gone, and Titus found very little that was positive about the Plymouth State game.
“We were terrible defensively, we didn’t communicate, and we didn’t slide our feet…we definitely took a step back.”
The Beacons had difficulty with Panther center Ryan Chicione (20 points, 11 rebounds), who, at six foot seven inches, had at least a three-inch height advantage over any UMB player. The team’s perimeter defense could not shut down Mike Loughlin, who connected on 6 of 10 three pointers (22 points total). PSU 2002-03 LEC Co-player of the Year Nick Pelotte added 17 points. Eddie Ramos of UMB had a double-double (20 points, 10 rebounds).
At one time during the first half, Plymouth State was out in front by as much as 15 points. But the Beacons went on a 10-2 run to cut the lead to 7. The momentum alternated between teams as UMB managed to keep the Plymouth State lead to seven going into halftime. Junior Roger Perry led all UMB scorers with 9 first half points.
The second half saw the Beacons continue to make many of the mistakes that plagued them in the first half. And this time, Plymouth State capitalized on more Beacon mishaps. Loughlin scored 17 of his 22 points in the second half, and the Panthers took control of the boards.
After the loss to Plymouth State, the Beacons appear doomed for the basement of the Little East Conference. Although the team will have already played UMass Dartmouth at press time, Titus had hoped to have his team ready for postseason.
“We need to prepare ourselves for the playoffs. So that’s going to be the goal. Can we beat [UMass] Dartmouth? Heck, yes we can. Can we beat Eastern Connecticut State here? Absolutely. But we got to come play, and play hard for 40 minutes. If we don’t do that, then all the excuses kick in. We could have beaten [Plymouth State]; I don’t want to hear about the excuses of height. If we do what we are supposed to do, then we’ll be all right.”
The Beacons will wrap up their season at home against LEC foe Eastern Connecticut State at the Clark Athletic Center on Saturday, February 21 at 3pm.