— By David Walsh
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Fall behind, further behind and then trail at the half.
In the second half, play catch up, finally pull even, but never go in front. Instead it’s the opponent who gets the upper hand, keeps it and wins.
So goes the Marshall basketball story of late. Saturday night, Rice led early, by 13 at the half (44-31), the Thundering Herd pulls even at 58-58 on a layup by Darius George with 8:35 to play. The 4,239 fans inside Cam Henderson Center get excited and get on their feet to root the Herd on.
Only to see the Owls score the next five points for a 63-58 lead and they would handle being ahead the rest of the way, winning 87-77, in Conference USA action Saturday night. Max Fiedler’s layup with 8:08 left put Rice ahead to stay, 60-58. Travis Evee then connects with a three for a 63-58 lead with 7:45 to go. Back to catchup for the Herd but to no avail.
“We really challenged the team on withstanding runs,” Owls coach Scott Pera said. “We’ not a young team anymore, we’re an older team. To win on the road, you’re going to have to withstand runs. We knew Marshall was going to make a run. We weren’t perfect. It’s not always going to be perfect. But every time they made a run, we responded. I thought we handled the pressure really well at the end. We didn’t turn the ball over. We made enough free throws to keep the separation. It was just an overall great team win.”
Rice (10-6, 3-2 C-USA) came into the game the top three-pointing shooting team in the league and Marshall found out why. The Owls, who average 9.9 threes a game, finished with 12 (12-of-20) to six (6-of-31) for the Herd, a team which has been quite reliant on outside shooting.
Carl Pierre made nine shots overall, but eight came from behind the arc on his way to a career-best 30 points. His eight threes ties a school record. Travis Evee went 9-of-13 (3-of-4 three) for 22 points. Max Fiedler added 11.
Taevion Kinsey led the Herd (7-10, 0-4 C-USA) with 31 points. He made 14-of-22 twos, but just 1-of-6 threes. He started the night as the top C-USA scorer at 19.9 per game. Obinna Anochili-Killen added 17 points. He hit 7-of-14 twos, but also went 1-of-6 from behind the arc. No Herd player who saw action had more than one three. In addition, Marshall made 1-of-6 free throws.
So the Herd’s losing streak goes to seven. Next up is a Florida road trip. The Herd visits Florida International on Thursday and Florida Atlantic on Saturday. FAU won the first meeting in Huntington.
“That’s been the constant the past couple of games,” Kinsey said. “They’re making shots, we’re killing ourselves. We’ve got to figure out how to stop making mistakes at the end. Got to let the guys know we have to turn this in a different direction.”
Marshall coach Dan D’Antoni looked at the stat sheet after the game and saw where the Herd led in most categories only to come up short.
“Somehow we’ve got to find a way to shoot the ball better,” D’Antoni said. “The more you call attention to it, the worse it gets. I’m with them. We’ve got to fight through this. They’ve got to see me put the sweat in. Coach hard, play hard, be positive with each other. Roll the dice that way and see what happens.”
D’Antoni saw positives, especially in the second half when the Herd charged back only to come up short again.
“We have to be better in big moments,” D’Antoni said. “We have to right the ship. We can’t stop shooting threes. They were not hard. We just have to knock them down.”
Rice has now won two straight against the Herd. The first was in the second round of the C-USA Tournament last season. The Herd leads the overall series 13-6. The Owls average 76.6 points a game and give up 74.2.
Pierre, the team’s No. 2 point scorer, is one of 10 active 300-plus point shooters in the country.
Anochili-Killen blocked five shots to bring his season total to 70 (second in the country).