By Kyle Kandetzki – SPORTS EDITOR
With their hot shooting disappearing from them almost all game, Hofstra finally heated up late for a comeback effort, but couldn’t reel in a third-place prize.
The Hofstra men’s basketball team fell in the Paradise Jam third place game, 67-66 to the Indiana State Sycamores. Hofstra trailed by as many as 17 points early in the second, but battled back to lead by seven with under two minutes left. The Pride, though, couldn’t score for the remainder of the period, and their efforts were all for naught.
The game as a whole was an offensive struggle at many times during the first half. It took over three minutes for the first points to fall, a bucket by Rokas Gustys.
Indiana State gave plenty of chances for the Pride, turning the ball over four times in the first eight minutes, but the Sycamores took advantage of cold shooting from the Pride on the other end. They went on a 9-0 run to pull to a 13-4 advantage in the opening eight minutes.
Hofstra’s nearly non-existent three-point shooting reemerged for thirty seconds, as Ameen Tanksley nailed back-to-back threes, his only points of the half, making the score 15-10.
Whereas Hofstra remained cold, Indiana State would fade at times as well. Only four points would be scored over the following four minutes (two from each side), before the Sycamores returned for an 8-0 run over the next minute, largely in the paint, where the Pride had struggled all tournament long.
Hofstra tried to reel in Indiana State one more time, making the score 25-19 with four minutes left, but another seven point run pushed the Pride back going into halftime, down 32-22.
The Pride struggled to get to the line, only taking five free throws, all by Gustys. He missed four of them, one of which was memorably air-balled. As for the deep ball shooting that the Pride relied on, they sat at 3-for-16. The Philly duo of Tanksley and Green both sat for a majority of the half due to foul trouble; Green managed zero points.
It didn’t seem like much changed coming out of the break, as Indiana State scored nine of the half’s first 11 points, leading to their largest advantage of the day, 41-24 with 17:37 to go.
Green finally scored his first points of the game seconds later, a three-pointer, followed by a bucket from Tanksley. The offense would go cold once more though, with just two points over the following two minutes.
Momentum finally turned after constant responses from the Sycamores midway through the half. Down 47-36, Green was fouled from beyond the arc with 11 minutes to go, allowing him to hit each three free throws to bring the deficit to single digits.
The Pride rattled off a 9-2 run, completed by a nice drive to the hole by Tanksley to bring the Pride within one, 49-48 with nine to go. But as they did all game long, ISU found some clutch shooting to keep Hofstra at bay, this time via two three-pointers by Brenton Scott to give them their largest lead in the closing minutes, 55-50.
Hofstra finally broke the Sycamore defense on a 9-2 run, and they took their first lead as a result, via a Koon layup with 6:20 to go. Koon was key in the second half; nailing a three two minutes later to tie things back up at 59-59.
Momentum seemed to permanently swing from there. Koon hit two free throws, Green completed a three-point play, and Malik Nichols threw down a dunk off of a steal with 1:50 left. The lead was 66-59 Pride.
But the Hofstra offense went cold one more time. Scott netted a three and two free throws to bring the lead down to two. Koon was fouled shortly after with a chance to put the game away in the final 30 seconds, but he missed both tries from the stripe. Indiana State made him pay.
Devonte Brown notched a three-point play on the ensuing drive, putting Indiana State out front 67-66 with 12 seconds left. Hofstra had two tries for a game winning score, but Green missed the first and Tanksley fell short on the second. The Pride failed to score in the final 1:49, and fell 67-66.
Green scored 18 points, all in the second half, and avoided his first single-digit point effort in a Pride uniform, despite going 6-for-18 from the field. Tanksley added 13 on 33% shooting, while Koon had his best game yet for Hofstra, with a double-double on 15 points and 11 boards.
Hofstra as a whole only shot 34% from the field, and 6-for-21 from deep. Indiana State turned the ball over 16 times, but Hofstra gained just 15 points from those turnovers. Khristian Smith ran the show for the Sycamores with 22 points.
Hofstra finished in 4th place at the Paradise Jam, and is now 3-2 on the season. They return to the U.S. for a road meeting with St. Bonaventure on Saturday at 4 p.m.
