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Saturday, Nov. 22, 2008

Winthrop men's basketball team's woes continue against Wildcats

DAVIDSON, N.C. -- Winthrop's men's basketball team kept it close for 10 minutes against Davidson on Friday night in sold-out Belk Arena, but the last 30 were anything but, as the 21st-ranked Wildcats buried the Eagles, 97-70.

It wasn't just Stephen Curry who did in the Eagle, even though the nation's leading scorer produced as quiet a 30-point, 13-assist effort as you could want. A lot of guys had a hand in it.

"But he was the facilitator," Winthrop coach Randy Peele said of Curry, who hit half of his 16 shots, nine of 10 free throws and probably could have had 20 assists if his teammates had been a little more sure-handed in the first half.

But 6-8, 220-pound Andrew Lovedale dumped 20 points and 15 rebounds on the Eagles, Steve Rossiter scored 13, Will Archambault added 12 and Bryant Barr 11 as the Wildcats shot 49 percent.

The 97 points were the most a Winthrop team has allowed in a regulation game since giving up 106 in to Syracuse in the opening game of the 1996-1997 season. They gave up 97 in a double-overtime win over Northern Illinois in 2006. And the loss dropped the Eagles to 1-3. The program hasn't been 1-3 since starting 1-7 in 1997-1998.

"Here's where we are," Peele said. "For 20 minutes, I was very pleased with the way we played. In the first half, we had several missed layups that had we made them we might have been tied or up four or five. We competed.

"But when we go through some adversity, with our maturity level, they (the players) want to do it their way. We abandon the system, and when we do, it's a roller coaster."

While it might have been a roller coaster for the Eagles, it was a funhouse for the Wildcats (3-1), after a first half when they, according to coach Bob McKillop, "settled for the home run instead of the single."

The Wildcats took 34 shots, 15 of them 3-pointers.

"We're not a home run hitting team," McKillop said.

But when he looked up at the scoreboard at intermission, his team was ahead 41-35, after trailing by six midway through the period.

The Eagles, showing some aggression on the offensive end, started red hot, hitting seven of their first 11 shots and building a 22-16 lead, a run that had the Wildcats back on their heels. Some of the shots, though, weren't the best. They just went in.

Over the last 10 minutes of the first half, they didn't.

The Eagles missed 16 of 20 shots over the final 10 minutes and had no answer in the lane for Lovedale, who had a career high in points and was just two off his mark for rebounds. The Wildcats outscored the Eagles 25-13, with Lovedale scoring 12. With 11 rebounds, he had a double-double in the first half.

"We could not control him inside," Peele said.

"He was a monster out there," Curry said. "I don't think anybody else got a rebound. He got us a lot of extra possessions."

That got the Wildcats to the locker room where McKillop insisted on better movement, better shot selection, patience and more intensity on defense.

He got it all.

With Curry orchestrating the offense, the Wildcats went on a 12-3 run to start the half, a start that just fueled their offensive efficiency. When Archambault scored with 3:36 left to push the lead to 89-59, it was the Wildcats' 20th score in 35 second-half possessions.

"We couldn't guard them," Peele said.

That was because of Curry, who has made the transition from shooting guard to point guard seamless. He plays like he was born there and shoots like he believes everything is going in.

At one point, he tipped the ball away toward midcourt, ran it down and could have driven for a bucket. Instead, he pulled up and swished a 3-pointer.

"We knew this would be a tough game," Curry said. "They hit some shots early on, and our defense was suspect. In the second half, we got stops."

The Eagles got 20 points from Cameron Stanley, 13 in the first half. Seven came in the first three minutes of the game. Mantoris Robinson had his first double-figure game, 10, but most of them came late.

Winthrop shot 38 percent for the game and turned the ball over 17 times. Just eight of their 22 baskets came off of assists, an indication the ball movement wasn't good enough.

Peele didn't like much of what he saw after the first half.

"I'm embarrassed," he said. "I'm not pleased. "And we're not going to blame it on the schedule. We can't feel sorry for ourselves."

The Eagles, who played four games in a week, don't play again until Tuesday night at N.C. State.