Wait ‘til next year for Rhody
URI season may be the beginning of something great
KINGSTON — Before the 2016-17 season had even started, Rhode Island coach Dan Hurley was well aware of the high expectations and scrutiny he was facing. In his fifth season at the helm of the program, it was the consensus, both nationally and locally, that this was the year he had to get his team into the NCAA tournament.
A local reporter even went so far as to ask Hurley – at the very first press conference of the season, mind you, before a single minute of a game had been played – if it would be considered a disaster if the team were to miss out on the tournament for the 18th consecu- tive season.
Rather than shy away from the expectations, Hurley faced them head-on.
“We check most of the boxes,” he said at the time. “Veteran team, we have shooting, we have guard play, we have depth. Size, great culture, leadership. It's the best team – in terms of talent and depth – I've had since my second year at Wagner. That's exciting.”
Those things that Hurley identified – experience, depth, leadership – helped lead his team to the promised land, meeting expectations and avoiding ‘disaster.’ The team won the thirdmost games in a season in program history, and in two separate contests, set program records for blocked shots and made 3-pointers.
It was far from roses all the way through. The Rams missed out on a handful of chances at resume-building wins in the non-conference, as they lost games to Duke, Houston, Valparaiso, and PC. An 8-4 record in the nonconference caused URI to fall from the national top 25 rankings and made some wonder if they had done enough in that phase of the season to earn an at-large bid.
While the non-conference slate was marked somewhat by missed opportunities, the lowest point of the first half of the season could not compare with how desperate things appeared toward the tail end of the Atlantic 10 schedule.
Sitting on an 8-4 record, the Rams had already squandered two chances to beat Dayton, and were facing a typically staid Fordham at home. While in their previous game against the Flyers, the Rams played up to their competition, against lowly Fordham, they played way down, scoring a season-low 43 points in a loss that many viewed as the beginning of the end for the team’s postseason chances.
“That was the worst home loss [I’ve had here], and that’s no disrespect to Fordham, they scrambled and played harder than we did,” said a disgusted Hurley following the loss. “It wasn’t a pretty game by an stretch. I don’t know how I allowed that to just happen, meaning the performance of our team.”
That painful loss was the beginning of something, but no one at the time could have guessed exactly what. The Rams would not lose another game until Oregon eliminated them from the NCAA Tournament on Sunday, ripping off a win streak that ended the team’s multi-decade NCAA-drought.
The nine-game win streak that followed the Fordham loss is tied for the longest of Hurley’s Division I coaching career. Five straight regularseason wins came over George Mason, La Salle, VCU, St. Joes and Davidson.
The Davidson win, on URI’s senior night, will surely be remembered by fans for years to come. Trailing by nine points late in the second half, it looked as if Davidson would put another, potentially final, nail in Rhody’s coffin.
The Rams dominated the final few minutes of regulation, tying the game and forcing overtime. Stan Robinson blocked a layup at the buzzer to get the game to overtime, and E.C. Matthews finally played like the stud he was before he tore his ACL.
Matthews scored the final eight points of overtime to will URI to a much-needed win. Matthews displayed a full-range of motion on the game-winning run, but more importantly showed that he had fully regained his confidence.
“I’ve been telling him he’s the best player in the A-10 all year,” said teammate and best friend Hassan Martin. “It’s nice to see him finally take over. That’s his game, that’s what he do. He ain’t showed much this year, but that’s E.C. I had to keep telling him that he was the man.”
From that game forward, Matthews was a driving force for his team. In the A-10 tournament, Matthews scored 58 points in three games. Over the course of the final two games of the tournament, wins against VCU and Davidson, Matthews hit nine consecutive 3-point attempts.
The win streak showed growth from individual players like Matthews, but it also featured team-wide developments that proved the difference when crunch time rolled around.
URI had been in a position to make the NCAA tournament in recent seasons, but always found a way to eliminate themselves from the equation through their own inadequacies. The 2007-08 season sticks out in particular: URI started the season 19-3, were nationally ranked and included in nearly every bracketologists forecasts. The team ended the season by losing seven out of their last nine regular season games, including a five-game losing streak.
Consider this year’s edition of the team the anti-2008 Rams. With their backs against the wall in the regular season finale, they found a way to win. When VCU came storming all the way back in the A-10 championship game, the Rams held their ground and took home a title. When
Creighton cut into the URI lead massively in the second half last Friday, URI hit 24 consecutive free throws to earn their first tournament win in 19 years.
These Rams learned how to win, to stave off adversity. More so than any other URI team this century, they got better collectively as the season wore on. Rather than expect a forthcoming disaster, URI fans began to believe their team would come up big in big moments.