UMass men’s basketball: Minutemen’s late lead slips, Bowling Green rallies for OT win

AMHERST — The UMass men’s basketball team opened the new year losing an overtime thriller, 101-100, against Bowling Green at the Mullins Center on Saturday. Despite holding a seven-point lead with under a minute to play in regulation, the Minutemen couldn’t hold on.

Facing the deficit, the Falcons scored in a hurry, knocking down two 3-pointers and converting an and-one at the rim for nine points in just 20 seconds.

Javontae Campbell accounted for six of Bowling Green’s nine points on the run, putting up a layup a few seconds later that was pinned against the backboard by Daniel Hankins-Sanford. The whistle blew, with the call being goaltending. The play was reviewed and upheld.

This left the Falcons down by three with the ball and 8.4 seconds on the clock. Campbell raised up for a contested 3-pointer on the right wing, where he was fouled by K’Jei Parker, awarding him three free throws. He knocked down all three, forcing the game into overtime.

“[Bowling Green] made some tough threes, some tough shots,” Leonardo Bettiol said of the final minute of regulation. “… They made the right plays; they find the right guy every single time… I feel like we executed whatever coach told us to do.”

In the overtime period, the Falcons hit a 3-pointer on the first possession, holding the lead for the rest of the five-minute frame for the win. Dwayne Wimbley Jr. had an open look from beyond the arc as the clock wound down, unable to hit the pull-up jumper.

Campbell got to the charity stripe four times in overtime, finishing his day with 47 total points. The senior was relentless getting to the rim all game long, with 17 of his 21 shot attempts being layups. He invited contact down low as well, shooting 27 free throws.

Fast breaks were where Campbell did most of his damage, flying down the court and weaving through traffic with his speed and agility to get behind the Minutemen.

“We spent two days in practice working on nothing but what we call bust outs, because that’s how [the Falcons] play,” UMass head coach Frank Martin said. “They just take the ball, and they just come 100 miles per hour down your necks. Nobody wanted the matchup. Everyone ran from it in the open court… He was coming, and guys would run away from him because nobody wanted to deal with him.”

With Campbell getting downhill so frequently, the Minutemen struggled to stay out of foul trouble. Seven different players for UMass had three or more fouls by the end of the contest, with Marcus Banks Jr., Jayden Ndjigue and Parker all fouling out.

The Minutemen looked softer and less aggressive on defense as the fouls continued to snowball. UMass tallied 32 fouls on the day, putting Bowling Green on the line 45 times.

“They’re gonna call some fouls, but we’ve [got to] stop shooting ourselves in the foot,” Hankins Sanford said. “Just stay in front of the ball and chest up, keep the ball in front, keep the man in front, and trust the help defense… It was hard to find some [defensive] consistency.”

Despite the loss, Saturday proved to be a big bounce-back game for Bettiol, finishing the day with 32 points and 14 rebounds. The senior had just two points in the team’s previous game against Eastern Michigan, and was an efficient 11-of-13 from the field and 10-of-14 from the free throw line.

Parker was efficient as well on Saturday, tallying 21 points on 6-of-9 from the field and 5-of-8 from the 3-point line.

The Minutemen weren’t perfect by any means offensively despite scoring triple-digit points for the second time this season, with the team totaling 18 turnovers, their most since the season opener against Marshall.

With the loss on Saturday, UMass has begun its first season in the Mid-American Conference 0-3 in conference play. With 15 more games against MAC foes left in the season, the Minutemen will look to turn things around.

UMass’ first chance to right the ship comes just three days after this one, traveling to Athens, Ohio, to take on the Bobcats on Tuesday, Jan. 6. Tipoff from the Convocation Center is set for 6 p.m., and the game can be streamed on CBS Sports Network.

“The MAC is a really good basketball conference,” Martin said. “This isn’t what was reported publicly by the talking heads on the east part of the country; that we’re going to walk in there and it’s going to be a layup line. The MAC is a really good basketball league.”

“… The bad is that we haven’t fixed our problems, not the scores, not the record,” Martin continued. “We haven’t fixed our problems… If we can own our problems, maybe we can win a game. Then we can start regaining a little confidence and feeling good about ourselves, rather than walking around with our feelings hurt, like we’ve been for two weeks.”