Pierria Henry scored seven points before leaving the game with an injury after he took an elbow to the throat in Charlotte’s A-10 quarterfinals loss to the Saint Louis Billikens. Photo by Nathan Butler
NEW YORK – The Charlotte 49ers struggled early and found themselves at an insurmountable deficit as they fell to the Saint Louis Billikens, 72-55, in the quarterfinals of the Atlantic 10 (A-10) Tournament at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Coming off an emotional, bizarre win in the tournament’s opening round against Richmond on Thursday, the 49ers came out sloppy against the Billikens, the number-one seeded team and regular season A-10 champion.
Saint Louis focused on stopping Charlotte’s low-post offense with early double teams and help defense. That effort resulted in several early turnovers, forcing Charlotte Head Coach Alan Major to call an early timeout with his team trailing 17-8.
Soon after the timeout, Charlotte forward Chris Braswell made a three-point basket to cut the Saint Louis lead to three. However, that margin would prove to be the closest for the remainder of the contest. The Billikens drained a three-pointer on each of their next three possessions to retain their lead, one they never relinquished throughout the game.
Major switched to a 3-2 zone in order to irritate the Saint Louis three-point shooters that seemingly could not miss. The strategy worked as the Billikens’ percentage dropped to 31.1 percent in the first half, but the damage had already been done on the other side of the ball.
At the end of the first half Charlotte had already committed 13 turnovers and Saint Louis had turned them into 16 points.
“We weren’t quite ourselves today,” Charlotte Head Coach Alan Major said of his team’s sloppy play. “I thought the best thing Saint Louis did today was disrupt us a little bit. Especially early in the game, we didn’t take care of the basketball. Got to give those guys credit.”
“I thought our defense generated a lot of good things for us from an offensive standpoint,” Saint Louis Head Coach Jim Crews said. “The zone gave us some problems for a while but then we got in a little bit of a rhythm.”
Defensively, Charlotte stayed with the 3-2 zone in the second half. The scheme worked well in the final 20 minutes as Saint Louis missed all of their seven three-point attempts and only managed to shoot 30.4 percent from the field.
No matter what Charlotte did offensively to get themselves back in the game, Saint Louis had an answer. With 12:44 left to play, Braswell hit another three to cut the lead to seven. Again, the Billikens answered with a demoralizing 9-0 run.
By the end of the game Saint Louis had scored 21 points off 20 Charlotte turnovers.
“They were just speeding us up. We were rushing, trying to make home-run passes,” Braswell explained.
After dominating Richmond in the low-post, the 49ers were outscored 28-24 in the paint by the Billikens. Charlotte did hold a slight advantage in rebounding (39-34).
Free throw shooting certainly did not help Charlotte down the stretch. The 49ers only made 54.5 percent of their free throws (12-of-22) while the Billikens shot 80.6 percent (25-of-31) from the charity stripe.
Braswell finished the game with 20 points and 10 rebounds (led Charlotte in both) for his second double-double of the season. The senior went 2-3 from behind the arc and made six of his eight free throws on Friday.
Willie Clayton put in eight points before fouling out with just over five minutes left to play. Pierria Henry scored seven a day after a career game against Richmond.
Henry left the game late in the second half after receiving an apparent elbow to the throat while defending near mid-court. The sophomore was immediately taken to a local medical center for further evaluation after experiencing breathing difficulties.
There is no word on the status of Henry at this point, but the entire Charlotte team promptly left the Barclays center after the loss to be with their teammate.
Saint Louis forward Dwayne Evans could score-at-will against Charlotte on Friday. The junior scored a game-high 25 points on 8-of-9 shooting. He also made all of his nine free throw attempts.
Evans also led his team in rebounding with nine boards, one shy of a double-double.
Despite only sinking three of his 13 field goal attempts, Cody Ellis contributed 13 points including six from the free throw line.
Saint Louis will advance to the semifinals of the A-10 Tournament where they will await the winner of the LaSalle-Butler game.
Charlotte will know their post-season destiny after all conference tournaments are completed this weekend. According to Director of Athletics, Judy Rose, the 49ers would accept a bid for the National Invitational Tournament (NIT) but not for the CBI or CIT.
“Honestly, my focus has been Richmond first and obviously Saint Louis today. I really have no clue, hopefully we get a chance to keep playing, that’s all I want,” Major added.