Immaculata men, women get swept at home by Neumann

EAST WHITELAND » The Immaculata men haven’t played much at Alumnae Hall this season, but it was still impressive that the Mighty Macs went deep into January without dropping a home contest.

Conference foe Neumann ended the streak on Wednesday, but IU certainly didn’t let it happen without a monumental tussle. Trailing by as much as 18 in the second half, the Macs staged a dramatic comeback bid, but ran out of gas late to ultimately fall, 85-76.

“We have a lot of freshmen, and we make freshmen mistakes,” said IU head coach Jayson Hyman. “The good thing is they compete. We just haven’t put two halves together with intensity. We are working on that.”

Now 8-9 overall, the Macs find them-

selves in a fight for a postseason bid. Six teams will qualify for the CSAC Tournament at the end of the regular season. At 5-6, Immaculata is are currently in seventh place, just a half game out of the top six. There are seven conference games to go, and five will be played at IU.

“The goal is to make the playoffs,” Hyman said. “Our young players are more comfortable at home. We’ve taken some lumps on the road, but I wanted those road games on the road in the first semester so we could get that toughness. Hopefully it pays off the rest of the way.

“If we can squeeze into the playoffs, we’ll be tough. Earlier this season, it was a sink or swim type of situation.”

The Mighty Macs fell by 27 at Neumann (9-3, 14-4) earlier this month, so Wednesday’s effort was more competitive. Unfortunately, IU was minus-eight on the boards, shot just 39 percent from the field and committed 15 turnovers.

“We’ll go minutes without scoring,” Hyman pointed out. “I had to go to the second unit right away in the second half to get back into it. But the energy just isn’t consistent.”

Down 11 with four minutes to go, the Mighty Macs made a final push, scoring seven in a row to make it 7773. And freshman Chris Lomax had an open 3-pointer that would have cut it to one, but it was off target and Neumann converted a fast break at the other end. The Knights then closed it out from there at the free throw line.

“We just need to keep fighting. We are right there,” said junior guard Mike Piekarski. “We cut it to five or six and can’t get over the hump.

“We tend to get ourselves in holes like that. We can’t wait to get down before we get going. Making a comeback takes a lot out of a team and then we don’t have as much for the last few minutes.”

Immaculata hung with the Knight until a midsecond half lapse enabled Neumann to open an 18 point lead. But the Macs regrouped to reel off a 16-4 run and sliced the deficit to six with six minutes remaining, only to fall back again.

“We’ve been digging ourselves out of holes all season,” Hyman said. “When we can get to the point where we are as consistent the first 20 minutes as the second 20, we’ll be much better. I’m confident we’ll get there this season.”

Piekarski scored 15 of his 18 points in the opening half to lead the way. Lomax and Joe McHugh each added 11 points and Brandon McCullough chipped in 10 for IU, who played a total of 15 guys.