The 2023-24 season has not been particularly kind to Loyola and UMBC, at least to this point.
Loyola enters a Feb. 14 contest at Lafayette with a 5-20 overall record and a 3-9 mark in the Patriot League, while UMBC enters a Feb. 15 matchup at Binghamton with a 7-18 overall record and a 2-8 mark in the America East. Both squads had a chance to get their seasons going in the right direction at home against the top teams in their respective leagues on Feb. 10, only to run into some familiar roadblocks.
Injuries have been a thorn in Loyola’s side this year, and the Greyhounds had just seven players active for their 76-62 loss to Colgate. Junior guard D’Angelo Stines (9.6 points per game, 17 starts) was out for a second straight game for undisclosed reasons. Sophomore guard Garrett Brennan (four starts) was out due to an ankle injury suffered the previous game. Junior guard Chris Kuzemka, who was expected to handle a key reserve role this season, remained out with a broken hand suffered in early December.
Loyola kept up with Colgate for much of the game but faded down the stretch, only mustering 23 points in the second half on 9 of 32 shooting after making 15 of 29 shots in the first half. Greyhounds head coach Tavaras Hardy didn’t point to fatigue, preferring to credit Colgate’s second-half defense and noting that the Raiders only had seven in the rotation themselves.
That doesn’t mean it’s easy to have such a thin rotation.
“We’ve been banged up throughout this year. It’s unfortunate, but this seven, they’ve all played,” Hardy said. “They’ve all had games where they’ve played 20-plus, most 30-plus minutes. I like the group, but it definitely makes it hard. It’s hard to take [point guard Deon Perry] out. We took him out and kind of got shell-shocked there for a second. But figuring out the rotation, I thought that group played well for a good portion of the game, just not enough to close it out.”
Freshman guard Jordan Stiemke made his third straight start and played a season-high 32 minutes, scoring 12 points on 5 of 10 shooting. A Bel Air native and C. Milton Wright graduate, Stiemke prepped for a year at The Loomis Chaffee School in Connecticut before coming to Loyola. Prior to this three-start stretch, his largest minute total of the season had come against Division III St. Mary’s just before Christmas.
But the Greyhounds need Stiemke now. Hardy especially liked when the 6-foot-5, 205-pound guard found his way to the rim to put back a missed 3-pointer by junior forward Milos Ilic early in the second half.
“He brings an energy. He’s out there playing hard. He’s obviously making some mistakes as you would as a freshman, but he’s giving us a spark,” Hardy said. “He’s shooting the ball. He’s getting us some extra possessions. [He had] a big rebound in the second half when we were struggling to score. That kind of got us some momentum, so I’m really happy and I’m really proud of his growth and development. [The coaching staff] has been doing a great job with him on skill work. He’s a learner. He’s a worker.”
Earlier in the day, UMBC fell to Vermont, 72-70. The Retrievers jumped out to a 25-5 lead — the Catamounts didn’t even make their first field goal until about eight minutes into the game — but 9-0 and 7-0 runs by Vermont cut into the lead, and by halftime, the Catamounts were only down, 35-27.
UMBC had a counterpunch for each Vermont run in the second half — until the last one, which put the Catamounts over the hump. Junior guard Shamir Bogues made a tough runner with 1.3 seconds left to break a 70-70 tie, an appropriate end to a season-high 23-point effort.
This isn’t the first big lead the Retrievers have let slip away. They had a 22-point second-half lead before losing to NJIT, 75-74, on Jan. 27. The trick now is to build off the positives from nearly beating perennial power Vermont rather than losing their edge, according to UMBC head coach Jim Ferry.
“We fought. I thought our guys played really hard,” Ferry said. “I thought we defended the hell out of them. I thought we played really connected offense for a while, and that’s why it’s so hard to beat that team. You’ve got to put them away and we didn’t. We made some great effort plays. We had some great stuff out of today’s game. Our will to fight, me personally, I don’t think it’s been here for a while. I’ve been on these guys about it. I thought it showed back up today, which is what we had prior to the NJIT game.”
Defense has been a struggle this year for UMBC, which ranks last in the nine-team America East in adjusted defensive efficiency, per KenPom, a college hoops analytics site. The Retrievers had allowed 93 or more points in three straight games entering the contest against Vermont before holding the Catamounts to 39.7 percent shooting on the day.
Against Vermont, the Retrievers were led by sophomore guard Dion Brown (25 points, six rebounds and three assists) and junior guard Marcus Banks Jr. (16 points, two assists and two steals). That was nothing new for Brown and Banks, the top scorers for a team third in the America East in adjusted offensive efficiency.
Brown is one of five freshmen or sophomores who received double-digit minutes against Vermont. Ferry wants to build his program with players who develop in his system rather than going heavy in the transfer portal every offseason.
“We’ve been in every game against all these older teams. You look at the three top teams in our league — Lowell, Vermont, Bryant — they’re all really, really old,” Ferry said. “Fortunately, they’re not going to be as old next year and we’ll be a little bit older. Listen, maybe re-evaluating it, maybe I’m wrong to do it this way. Maybe I should just try to get all old guys every year and rotate grad transfers every year, but I just don’t think that’s the right way to do it here, especially at this school.”
Photo Credits: Matt Pendleton and Gail Burton