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February 8, 2008 > Sports > Men’s basketball drops road contests against ECU and Tulane

Men’s basketball drops road contests against ECU and Tulane

By Kushagra Shrinath | Thresher staff

At the beginning of the season, the men’s basketball team knew that it would go through the growing pains that young and inexperienced teams often do. But no one expected things to get this bad. Before facing conference rivals Tulane University and Eastern Carolina University last week, the team’s leading scorer and rebounder, senior forward Paulius Packevicius, suffered a knee injury last Friday during practice and is expected to miss at least a month of action.

In Packevicius’ absence, Rice (3-18, 0-8 Conference USA) lost its tenth straight game to Tulane (15-7, 5-3 C-USA), falling by a score of 84-77 Saturday night at the Merrell Center in Katy, Texas. Four days later, the Owls headed on the road still in search of their first conference win only to be greeted rudely with a 64-45 loss at the hands of ECU (8-12, 2-5 C-USA).

The Owls, who are dead last in the conference in scoring offense, will now head to Dallas to take on Southern Methodist University tomorrow at 7 p.m.. The Mustangs (7-14, 1-8 C-USA) have also struggled this season — currently holding the second-worst scoring offense in C-USA.

Head coach Willis Wilson (Will Rice ‘82) believes that the improved play of his team and the favorable upcoming schedule should end the Owls’ 11-game losing streak.

“In so many instances, we’ve been our own undoing,” Wilson said. “We’re playing better basketball but we’re not playing good enough to win just yet. We haven’t been affected by crowds or affected by venues.”

Rice’s offensive woes were delayed for a bit last Saturday. Rice grabbed a 21-16 lead against Tulane midway through the first half on a layup by freshman forward Suleiman Braimoh. However, the Green Wave quickly gained traction and outscored the Owls 23-12 over the rest of the half to take a six-point lead into halftime.

In the second half the Owls battled back and found themselves down 42-41 after a layup by freshman guard Bryan Beasley. But the Green Wave proceeded to go on a 9-0 run, which was enough to pull away and seal the 84-77 victory.

Despite the defeat, Wilson said he believes his team played as well as they have all season.

“It was one of our most complete games of the year, considering the circumstances,” Wilson said. “I’m extremely proud of the way the guys played […] We just couldn’t make shots down the stretch.”

However, the contest with ECU on Wednesday was anything but complete. Instead, a lack of a legitimate offensive threat plagued the Owls, who failed to keep up with ECU’s 12-1 run in the middle of the first half. The Pirates’ lead swelled to 27-14, and they would go into the half with a 33-21 advantage.

The Owls went on a brief 7-0 run in the second half, as junior guard Rodney Foster nailed a three-pointer and fellow junior forward Aleks Perka put in a layin to cut the lead to 46-37 with eight minutes left. The Pirates then pulled away en route to the blowout victory.

End of article

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