NEW YORK – UMass didn’t necessarily play better than Hofstra in the second half of Sunday’s Basketball Hall of Fame Invitational at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y.
The Minutemen just played harder in a 71-56 win. The Minutemen outscored the Pride 41-26 after halftime.
They out rebounded Hofstra 24-14 after the break, and turned eight turnovers into 13 points. UMass pounded the paint for 26 points and limited the Pride to just eight points in the paint.
“We didn’t play well in terms of Xs and Os and making shots. The only thing that changed was effort and rebounding and being more physical,” said UMass forward Matt Cross, who was battling an illness over the weekend.
Freshman Tafara Gapare led UMass with 13 points in 20 minutes. Matt Cross (two blocks) and Dyondre Dominguez each added a dozen points, nine rebounds and two steals.
The Minutemen (8-2) out rebounded Hofstra 44-32 and held the Pride to 34 percent shooting from the floor. UMass scored 20 points off 17 Hofstra turnovers.
“We’ve been searching for a couple weeks for a couple guys that can play with some energy and some enthusiasm and some toughness,” UMass coach Frank Martin said. “I went with some different guys in the second half, and they provided that.”
The Minutemen grabbed 15 offensive rebounds and outscored the Pride 36-24 in the paint and 45-26 off the bench.
Keon Thompson contributed four assists and eight points.
“When you play a Frank Martin team, you know they’re going to be physical,” Hofstra coach Speedy Claxton said. “We said going in the tougher team was going to win, and they did.”
Gapare created his own 8-0 run midway through the second half. The freshman from New Zealand put UMass ahead 43-41 after banking in a turnaround jumper through traffic with 12:58 left. He made the and-one free throw, as well. He followed that with a 3 to make it 46-41, forcing a timeout by the Pride.
When Hofstra guard Jaquan Carlos (6-foot-0) switched onto the 6-foot-9 Gapare, he dropped in a layup.
Isaac Kante extended the spurt to 10-0 with a layup of his own with 10:47 left.
UMass’ lead ballooned to 19 at the 5:28 mark after Cross rolled in a layup on the fast break. That put the Minutemen up 62-43. It capped a 22-2 run that put the contest out of reach over nine minutes.
They led by as many as 21 when Dominguez snapped in a 3-pointer from the right corner with 3:38 left.
It was tight until that sizable spurt. Thompson gave UMass its first lead of the second half after sinking back to back jumpers from the right elbow that put the Minutemen up 40-38 with 14:38 left.
Hofstra hit back to back 3s exiting halftime and took a 36-32 lead. Cross hopped through the lane for a layup to even it again at 36 with 16:42 to go.
Hofstra built a 15-7 lead early as UMass shot and defended poorly over the game’s first seven minutes.
“The first half on offense we just kind of stood around and looked at each other and there was no movement. The guys that were moving it was a waltz, it was a ballroom dance,” Martin said.
Then Martin inserted Thompson, Gapare and Dominguez. The bench trio keyed a 13-2 run over the next three and a half minutes.
Gapare started it with a 3 at 11:19 to halftime, looking down to set his feet before splashing the triple. Thompson followed with a pull up jumper to cut it back to one possession. Then T.J. Weeks Jr. banked in a layup to bring the Minutemen within 1 and drew a foul shooting a 3 within 30 seconds of each other. He only made 1-of-3 from the line but tied the game at 17 with 9:42 to halftime.
Dominguez lofted in a floater at 9:18 to give UMass its first lead, 19-17. That advantage stretched to 22-19 before Hofstra responded.
The Pride’s Griffin Barouk swished a 3 with 49 seconds to halftime that tied the game at 30. UMass committed a charge, and Hofstra missed a 3 at the halftime buzzer to send the game to the break knotted.
Next up for UMass is a game in Springfield against North Texas (8-2) on Saturday at 3 p.m. at the MassMutual Center.
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.