AMHERST — UMass men’s basketball head coach Frank Martin confirmed Thursday that senior forward Daniel Rivera would miss the remainder of the regular season with a knee injury. The third-year Minutemen head coach didn’t offer a timetable for Rivera’s return, but did say that he had been playing through an injury for about a month.

The team ultimately decided it was best to shut him down for UMass’ final three regular season games – starting this Saturday against Rhode Island as well as games against St. Bonaventure and Loyola Chicago – to give Rivera time to get as close to 100 percent as possible for the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament, which begins March 12.

Rivera, a transfer from Bryant, is averaging 11.5 points (third on team) and a team-high 7.3 rebounds per game this season. Martin didn’t say specifically when Rivera hurt his knee, but in the month of February, the San Juan, Puerto Rico native is averaging only nine points per game – and scored only one point in UMass’ most recent outing at George Washington. Through the first five games of A-10 play, Rivera averaged 18.8 points per game. His injury has certainly slowed him down, so providing him a couple of weeks to rest is probably better than continuing to play hurt.

“He refused to miss [games], and now he’s done for the regular season,” Martin said of Rivera. “Can he play in the conference tournament? That decision will be made in two weeks.”

Elsewhere, Jaylen Curry has been back at practice this week after missing the last three games with a wrist injury. After the Minutemen’s loss to St. Bonaventure on Feb. 15, a game in which Curry didn’t play, Martin said that all tests came back negative on his wrist but there was still some discomfort painful enough to keep him out of the lineup. He then sat out the Minutemen’s 29-point loss at VCU and their 22-point loss at George Washington.

Barring any unforeseen setbacks the rest of the week, Curry is expected to suit up and start for UMass against Rhode Island this weekend.

“He practiced [Thursday], and he looked pretty good,” Martin said of Curry. “After five months of going at it every single day, all of a sudden you get two weeks off, you look lively out there. And he was excited to be out there. So unless something flares up between [Thursday] and Saturday, I see him playing on Saturday.”

That is good news for the Minutemen, but even better news for Rahsool Diggins, who can shift back to his normal role of playing off the ball. Diggins had been playing more point guard with Curry out, which has allowed teams to key on him more easily.

“[With Curry out], now it puts Rahsool on the ball, which means now people can put two guys on him because they know exactly where he’s at,” Martin said. “You can’t move him off the ball… Thank god Jaylen hopefully comes back, because now it’s easier to make the adjustments with Jaylen and Rahsool out there.”

Forward Akil Watson is another player dealing with a knee injury for UMass, and he’s expected to miss a chunk of time as well. Watson may only average three points per game in 10 minutes, but he’s someone Martin was likely going to have to play more with Rivera out – so his options are even more limited at the frontcourt position.

It’s no secret that he hasn’t found the recipe to success when it comes to his forwards and centers this season. Martin isn’t sure who the fifth member of the starting lineup is going to be (joining Curry, Diggins, Jayden Ndjigue and Daniel Hankins-Sanford), but some combination of Malek Abdelgowad, Shahid Muhammad, Luka Damjanac and Amadou Doumbia will have to get the job done down the home stretch of the regular season.

Rivera’s absence won’t be filled by any one player.

“It’s going to be a committee,” Martin said. “We’re going to need all those guys to help us. Luka has been playing more lately because we’re down Akil and Rivera… I expect him to get more minutes. And then those other guys by committee: Shahid, Malek and Amadou.”

Martin also mentioned that Curry had been begging to play despite the pain in his wrist. He asked the training staff for an injection in the injured hand so he could be out on the floor, but the doctors advised him otherwise because of where the pain was coming from. Rivera also received injections in his knee to help him give it his all while dealing with his injury.

The toughness and grit of each UMass player can’t be questioned, even if the Minutemen are having a down season.

“I would hope [people] would comprehend and respect the fact that we got a guy asking to get injected to play, and we got another guy that did get injected to play,” Martin said. “These are the kind of guys we got on our team, man. And we’re going to keep battling and try to be better today than we were yesterday, and try to figure out a way to go beat Rhode Island on Saturday.”