Outside of a 10-minute stretch in the middle of the game, VCU (15-4) dominated Rhode Island (14-5) to ease to a 81-57 victory at the Thomas M. Ryan Center in Rhode Island.
VCU now sits at 5-1 in A-10 play, only behind George Mason (15-5) in the A-10 standings, who are 6-1. VCU has been fantastic this season due to its two-way rotation. It’s full of players who are bought in on the defensive side of the ball while possessing the talents to get a bucket against the best of them. Since league play started, VCU is the only team in the A-10 that is top five in points per game (78.2) and points allowed per game (65.2), with its average margin of victory of 13 nearly double the second-best of 6.8.
“Excellent team, to be honest with you, they outworked us, outtoughed us in all areas. They were superior tonight,” Rhode Island head coach Archie Miller said. “For a long stretch of this game, it kinda felt like, man, I don’t know how we were involved in a one-possession game with how we were playing, but eventually, they cracked us.”
In this one, VCU’s best players came to play. Oklahoma transfer Joe Bamisile finished with a game-leading 24 points, the most he’s had in conference play. Another transfer, former Utah State Aggie Max Shulga, finished with 15 points, seven rebounds, three assists, and a plus-minus of 30.
The defensive leader for VCU was first-year Luke Bamgboye. He finished with nine rebounds, four steals and three blocks, including multiple blocked 3s. He even blew up Rhode Island’s final play of the first half by himself with his sheer size features, a 7-foot-2 wingspan.
The lone positive from this game from the perspective of Rhode Island was the impressive 19-2 scoring run they went on in under four minutes. That run cut their first-half deficit from 18 to just one. At that moment, it looked like URI’s offense could steamroll its way through the VCU defense just like it did against Davidson (12-7). VCU responded by holding URI to zero points in the final 1:45 of the first half and getting four points of its own thanks to free throws and a buzzer-beating dunk from fifth-year Zeb Jackson.
To start the second half, Rhode Island held VCU to just two points for the first six minutes. Unfortunately, Rhode Island failed to capitalize on its defensive success, only scoring six points during that time, partially because Rhode Island turned it over three times in those six minutes.
Those turnovers weren’t all that surprising, considering Rhode Island turned it over once every 1:48 minutes. URI finished with 27 turnovers to just six assists – the most URI turnovers in the 23-year history of the Ryan Center and its most since a 67-41 loss at Houston in 2005.
Those 27 turnovers directly resulted from Rhode Island being unprepared for VCU’s elite press defense. URI turned it over six times on simple inbound plays. Those sloppy turnovers eventually led to the home fans booing their own squad and leaving en masse with more than five minutes to play as their team was down 19 points.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been in a game that’s had 27 turnovers,” Miller said. “It doesn’t matter who you play. If you turn the ball over 27 times, you’re never going to win. We just were not ready, weren’t prepared. At the end of the day, I’ll shoulder all that. We have a better team than we played tonight.”
That 19-2 run towards the end of the first half saved Rhode Island from getting embarrassed and being totally and utterly humiliated in a way resembling last season.
“The resiliency, the togetherness, our ability level to fight we showed in spurts,” Miller said. “The five-minute mark at the half, it could’ve went really different at halftime, but we fought there and kinda worked.”
However, outside of that five-minute stretch, this game was embarrassing in what has been an overall successful season for URI. To outscore an opponent by 17 points in under four minutes and still lose by 24 points creates some difficult questions, such as how did Rhode Island prepare for this game in the first place?
“When you play against a team that’s pressing on every make and every dead ball you at some point in time as a player don’t just get denied,” Miller said. “The inbounder who is inbounding the ball, run the baseline, move, don’t panic, and we probably had in general probably had six to eight turnovers. Again, that’s on me, I have to teach them how to get open and run better press offense.”
At no point did any Rhode Island player run said baseline or show the poise not to panic when VCU crashed the Rhode Island inbounds. Miller and his staff seemed to have little to no press offense prepared for VCU, a team known for its elite press defense. It led to clear frustration between teammates after URI turned it over back-to-back inbounds multiple times.
Individually, there were very few positives for Rhode Island. Fourth-year Sebastian Thomas finished with 19 points and a season-low one assist. Thomas entered the game holding the longest active streak in Division I of eight 20-plus point games. Despite his best efforts, that streak ended after an 0 for 2 trip to the free throw line with 1:23 to go.
Tyonne Farrell (ankle) missed a second straight game for Rhode Island, leading to fourth-year Jaden House getting his third straight start. House has provided value to the Rams as a spark plug sixth man. However, in the role of secondary ball handler, House struggled immensely. He finished the game with 15 points on six made shots and turned it over several times. In House’s defense, he was only tasked with those responsibilities due to the benching of third-year Jamarques Lawrence.
Lawrence, who didn’t start the second half, had three turnovers and three fouls. Almost all his turnovers were on those mind-numbing inbound mishaps. It was truly a bad day for every Ram wearing Keaney Blue, besides backup second-year big David Fuchs, who had nine rebounds, a block and a steal.
Rhode Island will now travel to Philadelphia to take on La Salle (10-8) on Saturday. That game marks the start of a three-game stretch where the Rams are playing some lesser squads in the A-10. After La Salle, they play UMass (8-11) and Fordham (8-10). Interestingly, Fordham’s head coach, Keith Urgo, returns from his four-game suspension to coach his Rams in another Ram-on-Ram A-10 clash. If Rhode Island wants to prove that it is as legit as it looked in the non-conference portion of the schedule, they must go 3-0 in the next two weeks.
