Men’s basketball fades fast

Men’s basketball team practicing in Mark Twain last week. Ahmad Aljuryyed / the current

The University of Missouri-St. Louis men’s basketball team saw its worst losing skid in several seasons extend to eight straight with two road losses last weekend at Southern Indiana and Kentucky Wesleyan.
The Tritons had not lost more than six games in a row since the season before head coach Chris Pilz took over in 2003. But to avoid claiming that dubious honor this season, the Tritons knew they were facing a mighty tough task and needed to win a game on the road against two of their toughest opponents of the season.
Southern Indiana came into Thursday’s contest with a 19-0 record, and was ranked No. 2 in the country in last week’s NCAA Division II national poll. Saturday’s opponent, Kentucky Wesleyan, which was ranked No. 16 in the national poll, had a 21-3 record when it hosted UM-St. Louis.
But it was the Tritons who controlled the action against both opponents, forcing them to play UM-St. Louis’ slow down, grind-it-all style.
Against USI, the Tritons played about as well as could be expected in such a hostile environment, and trailed just 26-20 at the half.
But USI opened the second half with a 21-7 run that turned what had been a close game into a 47-27 blowout with just over 10 minutes left.
The Screamin’ Eagles eventually led by as many as 23 points before finishing off a 59-44 win over the Tritons. USI standout guard and GLVC leading scorer Jamar Smith, a player many professional scouts believe might get selected in this summer’s NBA Draft, led the Eagles with 14 points.
For UM-St. Louis, Nico Oestbye, freshman, undecided, had a career-high 14 points, including four three-pointers to lead the Tritons.
On Saturday against Kentucky Wesleyan, UM-St. Louis once again got off to a good start. Sam Buxton, sophomore, international business, made a layup off of a nifty pass from Beaumont Beasley, sophomore, undecided, to make the score 11-10 with just over 11 minutes left in the first half.
Unfortunately for the Tritons, that was the last field goal they would make for the entire half. UM-St. Louis missed their final seven shots and committed six turnovers in the final 11 minutes of the half, only managing to score on four free throws by Eddie White, junior, elementary education.
KWC led 29-14 at the half. UM-St. Louis managed to cut into the deficit slightly when Zach Redel, sophomore, undecided, made two free throws and a short jumper to make the score 32-20 with 16:04 left.
But the Tritons went the next 10 minutes making only one field goal—a jumper by Beasley—and saw their deficit grow to as many as 28 points before KWC began to pull its starters out of the game. The final score was 66-30, and UM-St. Louis’ losing streak was now at eight games.
The Tritons now stand at 10-13 on the season, and will look to end the losing streak with two more road games this week. On Thursday, UM-St. Louis will play at Rockhurst before moving on to play at Drury on Saturday.
UM-St. Louis will close out its regular
season with two home games next week against Missouri S&T on Thursday, Feb. 18, then against Maryville on Saturday, Feb. 20.
Both those games will
be played at the
Mark Twain Building and will tip off at 7:30 p.m. and 3 p.m., respectively.