AP Photo

March 11, 2009 | AP Press

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Melquan Bolding had 23 points to lead five Duquesne players in double figures in the Dukes’ 91-81 victory over Massachusetts in the first round of the Atlantic 10 tournament Wednesday night.

Aaron Jackson added 18 points and seven assists for the Dukes (19-11), who advanced past the first round for just the second time in their last 13 trips to the A-10 tournament. Bolding contributed a career-high 13 rebounds.

No. 7 seed Duquesne will play second-seeded Rhode Island at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in a quarterfinal game.

Chris Lowe had 23 points and Anthony Gurley scored 22 for UMass (12-18), which has lost eight straight A-10 tournament games. Ricky Harris added 17 and Tony Gaffney had 11 points and 10 rebounds for the Minutemen.

Duquesne, which led by as many as 19 points in the first half, broke open a tight game in the second half with an 11-2 run that was capped by Eric Evans’ four-point play that gave the Dukes a 73-66 lead with 5:22 left.

Starting Thursday afternoon, John Lamb of A10CollegeHoops.com will be courtside at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, NJ to bring you live coverage of the Atlantic 10 Men’s Basketball Conference Tournament. We will be giving you with live updates throughout the day. If it happens on the court, you will read about it right here.

With so many players, media personalities and other distinguished guests in the house you can bet that we will have plenty of interviews and other features to keep you busy in-between sessions. John will also be running a live blog for each game in case you don’t have access to television or radio.

Keep it here even after your favorite team experiences the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat as we will be sharing audio from all of the post game press conferences that take place throughout the week.

If you have any questions, concerns or comments please feel free to contact us via the link at the top of the page, by posting in the comments section or reaching out to us during one of the live blogs.

Finally, here is a down and dirty version of how John thinks tomorrow’s set of games will play out.

#8 La Salle vs. #9 St. Louis – This is certainly an interesting matchup as these two teams played this passed Saturday. Just like the last meeting, La Salle walk out with the W and move on to Day 2 of the tournament. This time they will do it by beating St. Louis at their own game: defense. This will be an ugly, defense-first kind of game.  EXPLORERS 62, BILLIKENS 54

#5 Saint Joseph’s vs. #12 Charlotte – SJU handled the 49ers in their previous matchup back in January but that was then and this is now. Neither team is really setting the world ablaze as Charlotte has dropped four of five since upsetting Xavier at Halton Arena and the Hawks have played .500 ball to the tune of 7-7 since defeating Charlotte. Although Coach Martelli has been justifying playing four of his five starters for 34 minutes-plus a game by saying that they are t0o young to be tired, it looks like the Hawks are running on fumes. Charlotte pulls off the minor ‘upset’ and we will be left wondering just how good Ahmad Nivins would have been if he had a complete team around him. 49ERS 74, HAWKS 67

#7 Duquesne vs. #10 Massachusetts – The resurgent Dukes of Duquesne played Umass in late February in Amherst and walked away with a 17 point victory. Massachusetts has talented players in  Chris Lowe, Tony Gaffney and Ricky Harris but they haven’t fully absorbed Derek Kellogg’s system. The Dukes, on the other hand, have become a dangerous team in league play under third-year coach Ron Everhart. Gone are the days of Duquesne being an automatic ‘W’ as this squad is for real and could give Rhode Island some serious competition. The Dukes lost by two to the Rams on March 1 and would love nothing better than to end URI’s season. DUKES 83, MINUTEMEN 71

#6 Richmond vs. #11 St. Bonaventure – This is an intriguing match up as one of the Bonnies six A-10 victories came at the expense of the Spiders back in January. Coming into this game there are those that are calling Richmond a dark horse to win it all. I suppose beating the best team in the conference on your home floor can get people talking about you. The Spiders have one of the best young coaches in the game in Chris Mooney and two talented guards: David Gonzalvez and Kevin Anderson. The Bonnies have a tremendous talent of their own in the form of A-10 Rookie of the Year Andrew Nicholson. While I think that Richmond will win the game and go on to face Dayton on Thursday, St. Bonaventure may very well be a force in the Atlantic 10 next year. The Bonnies will return four of their five starters and all but one of their contributing bench players. Mark Schmidt should be commended for the job he is doing with a program that was once a laughingstock. SPIDERS 67, BONNIES 61

John Lamb can be reached at johnlamb@a10collegehoops.com

AP Photo

March 7, 2009 by Chris Frechette | A10CollegeHoops

KINGSTON, RI — The stage was set for another big win for URI.  Marquis Jones had just hit two free throws to put the Rams up 71-70 with just six seconds to play.  After a UMass timeout, the Minutement inbounded the ball to their star point guard, Chris Lowe.  Lowe then dribbled the ball coast to coast for a gamewinning layup over Ram forward Kahiem Seawright to win the game, 72-71. 

Lowe got a little help on the play by teammate Matt Glass who made a crippling blind pick on URI defender, Lamonte Ulmer, sending Ulmer to the floor in a heap.  URI and it’s 7,707 fans in attendence were waiting to hear a whistle blown on the play that didn’t come.  Maybe if the play was earlier in the game, a whistle would’ve come, but not in the final seconds.  The Rams and Ram faithful just stood stunned after what had just transpired. 

It was games like these URI was just getting used to winning.  Like the Dayton game a few weeks back where the crowd rushed the floor on “Pinkout night” after Jones hit the game winning basket.  The feeling was similar at the sold out Ryan Center on senior night.  After  Jones drove the lane and was fouled by UMass center, Luke Bonner, Jones hit both free throws to put the Rams up by one.  Security advised those in the courtside seats to prepare to take cover in case the crowd rushed the floor again.  Unfortunately for URI, that scenario didn’t come.

Chris Lowe led the Minutement with 18 points and 7 assists.  Also in double figures for UMass (12-17, 7-9 A-10) were Ricky Harris with 13 points, Gary Corriea with 12, and Matt Glass with 13 points all in the first half.  It appreared as though Glass couldn’t miss as he hit open shot after open shot going 5-6 from the field and 3-4 from behind the 3 point arc.

URI Coach Jim Baron acknowledged the open shots allowed by his Rams.  “They shot the ball well,” he said.  “We let them have open shots and they hit them”. 

In the first half URI wasn’t hitting anything from 3 point range, going 0 for 12 from threes in the entire first half, including o for 5 from URI guard Jimmy Baron.  Baron did heat up in the second half scoring 16 of his game high 22 points on 4 of 7 shooting from three point range.  URI was also led by Lamonte Ulmer’s 12 points, mostly on alley oops, dunks and layups.  Ulmer shot 5 for 6 from the field and 2 for 3 from the charity stripe.  Delroy James chipped in 12 points and 12 rebounds.

URI’s first three pointer came with 14:47 left in the second half from Jimmy Baron, who was the only Ram to hit a three pointer in the whole game as the Rams went 4 for 19 (21%) for the game.  Baron’s second three at 5:57 left in the second half broke the URI single season three point record of 99 as well as the Atlantic 10 all-time record of 342.  Baron ended up with 102 threes for the season and 344 for his career.

One can only wonder what this loss means for URI (22-9, 11-5 A-10) in their quest for an NCAA tourney bid.  The A-10 would clearly like to be represented by 3 teams in the NCAA tourney, but the problem seems that their top teams aren’t closing the season out with wins.  Temple, Dayton and now URI have all lost within the last seven days.

URI players and coaches wouldn’t speculate what this loss does for their tourney hopes, but UMass coach Derek Kellogg thinks highly of the Rams.  “They’re a NCAA tournament quality team,”  he said.  But Kellogg also wouldn’t speculate if this loss burst the Rams bubble.

“You got to give credit to Lowe, he made some big plays,”  Baron said.  “He made a great play with the layup on the last play”.

When asked about senior night, Baron said, “It’s emotionally draining, we were flat, and I knew it would be a hard fought game.  You can’t take anything for granted”.

The Rams need to heed that advice and not let the NCAA committee decide their fate.  Their way into the Big Dance may now only come by winning the A-10 tournament.

AP Photo

March 4, 2009 | AP Press

AMHERST, Mass — Ricky Harris had 19 points and Tony Gaffney added 11 points, 10 rebounds, five steals and three blocked shots as Massachusetts edged George Washington, 77-62, on Wednesday. The win clinched the Minutemen (11-17, 6-9 Atlantic 10) a berth in next week’s conference tournament in Atlantic City. UMass is guaranteed the No. 11 seed in the field and will play a first round game against the No. 6 seed.

George Washington (10-17, 4-11) needs to beat Temple on Saturday and for Charlotte to beat St. Bonaventure to get in.

The Colonials led 36-33 at halftime and after an early second half surge by the Minutemen, took the lead again 50-48 on a dunk by Rob Diggs, who led George Washington with 22 points and nine rebounds.

But a 3-pointer by freshman David Gibbs’ started a 7-0 Minuteman run that gave UMass the lead to stay.

Damian Hollis added 12 points, nine rebounds and five assists for George Washington.

AP Photo

March 1, 2009 | AP Press

PHILADELPHIA — Rodney Green and Darryl Partin each scored a career-high 30 points to lead La Salle past Massachusetts 97-88 on Sunday.

Ruben Guillandeaux added 14 points while Vernon Goodridge had 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Explorers (16-12, 7-7 Atlantic-10), who set season highs in both points and 3-pointers (10).

Ricky Harris scored 20 points, all in the final 11:12, and Anthony Gurley also had 20 for the Minutemen (10-17, 5-9), who have dropped four of their last five. Chris Lowe added 15 points and nine assists and David Gibbs had 10 points.

La Salle led 46-29 at halftime and extended the margin to 26 points twice in the second half. A three-point play by Guillandeaux gave the Explorers a 72-46 lead with 11:21 remaining.

Massachusetts used runs of 11-2 and 11-3 to cut the margin to 84-75 on a layup by Lowe with 2:23 left. But the Explorers hit 13 of 14 free throws in the final 2:16 to seal the win, with Green going 6-for-6 and Partin 5-for-6.

February 25, 2009 | AP Press

AMHERST, Mass. – Bill Clark’s 22 points led five Duquesne players in double figures as the Dukes defeated Massachusetts 94-77 Wednesday night.

Duquesne (17-9, 8-5 Atlantic 10 Conference) finished the first half on a 15-4 run to take a 46-35 lead at the break. Massachusetts made a late surge and cut its deficit to 10 on a Gary Correia’s 3-pointer with just under six minutes left, but never got closer.

Damian Saunders added 18 points and seven rebounds for Duquesne, while Aaron Jackson had 17 points, nine assists and five rebounds. Eric Evans scored 14 points and Jason Duty had 10, rounding out double-digit scorers.

Anthony Gurley led Massachusetts (10-16, 5-8 A-10) with 18 points off the bench, Ricky Harris added 14 points and Matt Glass had 12.

The 94 points were the most Massachusetts surrendered this season. The Minutemen lost despite hitting 16 3-pointers, breaking their record for threes in a game.

February 22, 2009 | AP Press

PHILADELPHIA — Chris Lowe hit two free throws with two seconds remaining, and Tony Gaffney had 17 points and 10 rebounds, as Massachusetts nipped Saint Joseph’s 70-69 on Sunday.

Lowe scored 13 points and added seven assists to become the school’s all-time leader with 640, passing Carl Smith. Ricky Harris contributed 11 points for the Minutemen (10-15, 5-7 Atlantic 10), who snapped a two-game losing streak.

Tasheed Carr connected on a pair of free throws to give the Hawks a 69-68 lead with 6.4 seconds left.

Lowe took control of the ball at halfcourt, drove to the basket and was fouled by Ahmad Nivins.

Nivins had 21 points and 11 rebounds, his 18th double-double, Idris Hilliard added 12 points and 11 rebounds, Carr contributed 12 points and Garrett Williamson had 10 for Saint Joseph’s (14-12, 7-5).

The Hawks have dropped four in a row for the first time since the 2004-05 season.

Saint Joseph’s was 0-for-7 from 3-point territory, snapping a streak of 495 consecutive games with at least one 3-pointer made. The streak began at the start of the 1993-94 season.

The last time the Hawks went without a 3-pointer came in a 56-34 loss at Southwest Missouri State in the first round of the NIT Tournament on March 18, 1993.

February 18, 2009 by Chris Maza | A10CollegeHoops

AMHERST, Mass. – The UMass student section’s “blackout” couldn’t stop Keith Cothran from shooting lights out.

As the UMass fans donned all black in an attempt to throw the Rhode Island Rams off their game, Cothran found his with a career high in points and URI came back from a 12-point deficit to beat the Minutemen, 71-59, at the Mullins Center Wednesday night.

“He’s very aggressive and he attacks the bucket,” Rams head coach Jim Baron. “He’s a kid who just plays hard. He creates problems because he’s a big guard.”

Cothran came off the bench to score 26 points on 11-of-17 shooting.

Keith Cothran – Rhode Island Rams (G)

“I just knew I wanted to go out there and be aggressive,” Cothran said. “I watched film on them and they like to scramble (on defense), so I just wanted to hit the open shots and drive to the basket.”

It was an incredibly big effort on a night when usual team leaders Kahiem Seawright and Jimmy Baron disappeared. Baron, who came in averaging 16.6 points per game, was a non-factor throughout, scoring six points on 1-of-7 shooting. His lone field goal came in the final minutes of the first half. Seawright scored just four points.

Cothran and the rest of the Rams bench came through, however, combining for 43 points.

“It was tremendous. I think our younger guys stepped up,” Jim Baron said. “We had a lot of guys stepped up and in this league, you can’t do it with one or two guys. You need to have a number of guys being able to step up and our guys really showed it.”

UMass jumped out to a lead right off the bat with a pair of three points to start the game and didn’t give up the lead for the rest of the half. The Minutemen extended the lead to 12, the largest of the game, with a floater in the lane by Ricky Harris and a put back by Tyrell Lynch, putting the score at 31-19.

But the Rams charged back into it with a 9-0 run to end the half and close within three points at 31-28 going into the half.

Rhode Island finally took its first lead in the second half on Cothran’s three-pointer, but UMass posted an 8-0 run to jump back out front, 47-41.

The Rams finally took the lead for good with 2:28 remaining when Seawright hit two free throws to give Rhode Island a 59-57 lead. Those free throws sparked a 12-2 run to end the game.

“It’s getting a little redundant. We play really great basketball for 36 minutes and then almost figure out a way yourself to lose,” UMass head coach Derek Kellogg said.

After being held to 29 percent shooting in the first half, Rhode Island rebounded and shot at a 60 percent clip to outscore UMass, 43-28, in the second half. Meanwhile, UMass shot consistently poorly, hitting just 37 percent of its attempts.

 The Minutemen got 15 points apiece from Harris and Chris Lowe. Lowe also dished five assists, leaving him one short of becoming UMass’ career leader. Tony Gaffney added 11 points and blocked six shots, but no one took charge for the Minutemen down the stretch.

“Until someone steps up and says, ‘I’m going to take this game over, I’m going to be tough, I’m not letting us lose,’ we’re going to continue to throw games away at the end and our season will end before we know it,” said Gaffney.

It was UMass’ second straight loss and sixth in its last eight games. At 9-15 and 4-7 in the Atlantic 10, the Minutemen drop into a tie with St. Bonaventure with one of the conference’s worst records.

The win was a huge boost for the Rams, who leapfrogged St. Joseph’ to take over 4th place in the standings with an 8-4 conference mark. They are 19-8 overall on the season.

February 14, 2009 | AP Press

OLEAN, N.Y. — Maurice Thomas scored 18 points and had seven rebounds to lead St. Bonaventure over Massachusetts, 83-75, Saturday in Atlantic 10 conference play.

Chris Matthews also scored 18 points for St. Bonaventure (13-11, 4-7). Jonathan Hall scored 13 points and had 10 rebounds while Malcolm Eleby turned in 12 points and seven assists.

For Massachusetts (9-14, 4-6), Tony Gaffney scored a game-high 21 points and Ricky Harris scored 19. Chris Lowe and Luke Bonner added 13 and 11 points, respectively.

With Massachusetts leading 17-12, St. Bonaventure kicked off a 9-2 run with 13:06 left in the half to tie the game at 21. The contest stayed neck-and-neck until 2:24 remained in the game, when Matthews hit a 3-pointer to give the Bonnies a 75-73 lead. Andrew Nicholson followed up Matthews shot with a slam dunk that effectively put the game away for St. Bonaventure .

February 11, 2009 | AP Press

NEW YORK, NY – Tony Gaffney and Ricky Harris each scored 19 points and Massachusetts routed Fordham 91-68 on Wednesday.

Chris Lowe added 10 points for and a game-high seven assists for the Minutemen (9-13, 4-5 Atlantic 10).

Mike Moore led the Rams (3-18, 1-8) with 21 points. Fordham has lost three straight games, each by at least 23 points. Jio Fontan added 19 points for the Rams, and Jacob Green and Herb Tanner each scored 10.

Gaffney scored Massachusetts’s first five points, leading the Minutemen to a 9-0 lead.

Luke Bonner had a pair of 3-pointers in a 12-0 run that made it 34-13 with 8:46 of the first half. Then UMass ended the half on a 7-0 run to lead 57-28 at the break.

The Minutemen shot 51 percent from the field.