The Lake Region State College men’s basketball team couldn’t land their shots Wednesday night. It led to a frustrating 68-50 loss at home to Bismarck State College, ending a three-game winning streak.
“We just couldn’t make shots tonight. It seemed like there was a lid on the hoop,” head coach Jared Marshall said.
The loss moved the Royals to 6-11 on the season and 2-5 in conference play, putting them in seventh place in the Mon-Dak Athletic Conference.
LRSC, which is shooting 43.6% from the field this season, shot just 30.5% on Wednesday. The Royals underperformed in three-point shooting too, with just a 15.8% mark compared to its season average of 29.6.
Neither team, in fact, scored until nearly three minutes into the game. The first two baskets went to Bismarck State. Back-to-back threes from Ginuwine Tropnas and Harrison Raynor put the Royals in the lead, 8-2, but they were outscored 31-16 for the rest of the first half.
“I think at this point, maybe it’s a mental thing for us,” Marshall said. “The more we missed, the tighter we got, the worse our decision making got.”
Marshall was vocal with his team on the sideline, trying to get them to step up, relax and play their best game. But the Royals struggled to keep up the pace with Bismarck State’s offense, despite a solid night from LRSC defensively.
“One of the timeouts, I said, ‘Everybody take a breath, close your eyes, visualize the ball going through the hoop,’” Marshall said. “Trying anything and everything. We just gotta get more shots over here, I guess… At the end of the day, it’s basketball, and the hoop’s 10 feet, and you gotta put the ball through the hoop.”
Down 33-24 at halftime, the Royals had a chance to take a quick rest, shake off the rust and get back in the game. Nine points, after all, is a manageable deficit to overcome in a 20-minute half of basketball. The team’s best shooter this season, Blessed Barhayiga, had only made two baskets, and the Royals have generally shown themselves to be a better shooting team than what they’d shown in the first half.
But Bismarck State captured all the second-half momentum instantly. The Mystics began the half with a 10-0 run, fueled by back-to-back threes, including the third from Isaiah Davis.
“I was really disappointed with that 10-0 start,” Marshall said. “I thought we came out of the locker room with pretty good energy, and then to let them start the second half 10-0… We missed shots. We had turnovers. And then we really didn’t provide much of a resistance defensively — especially from our starting five, I was pretty frustrated by that.”
The 6-foot-8 Barhayiga had a better second half, shooting 3-of-5, but still didn’t get into the rhythm that has fueled some of LRSC’s wins this season. Even with a relatively down game, his 10 total points were the most of any Royal on Wednesday. Raynor was right behind him with nine.
“I think part of it is we stopped running our offense which gets [Barhayiga] the ball in the position he makes,” Marshall said. “He was just getting the ball out of position. But I thought they were pretty physical with him, and I thought maybe that kind of bumped him off his stuff.”
It was a coast to the finish line, with LRSC never close enough to make any kind of serious comeback bid. The 68 points allowed was better than the Royals’ season average of 75.5 (which also happens to be their offensive points per game), but a 50-point performance wasn’t going to cut it.
LRSC’s three-game winning streak came to an end, putting a halt to a boost of momentum in its season.
“I thought the last two games we’d done some good things, and I thought we carried a little momentum,” Marshall said. “So to come out and not have the game we wanted to have is disappointing. Because I thought first semester, we let some games get away from us, and it spiraled on us. And so that’s the key for us, is to not let one turn into two, to three, to four.”
The Royals’ next opponent will be the last-place Williston State College Tetons. The Royals beat them in an early-November matchup, 89-75. They’ll return to Devils Lake Sports Center on Sunday with a chance to get back on track. With a 2-6 conference record, LRSC is one game back of fifth place and two games back of fourth place.
“I think if we continue to guard the way we guard; they run some good actions, we’ll be okay,” Marshall said. “Now, [the Tetons] run primarily zone, so we’re gonna have to step up and hit some outside shots or pound the ball inside to the bigs. That’s kind of what we did the first time when we played them is got it inside, and that opened up our shooting on the outside. But the big challenge is not to be stagnated against their zone, and really put some pressure on it by making a move.”
Sunday’s game begins at 3 p.m. following the LRSC and Williston State women’s matchup.
