WINSTON-SALEM — Livingstone College’s men’s basketball team is making progress, but it’s progress that’s being measured in inches rather than miles.
The Bears (1-11 overall, 0-4 CIAA) had ample opportunity to upset a tired, frustrated Winston-Salem State team in front of 5,000 fans at the Joel Coliseum on Monday afternoon, but withered in the second half and fell 88-67.
The Rams (12-3, 3-3), who had lost an emotion-charged game at Johnson C. Smith less than 24 hours earlier, led only 31-30 at the half. But in the second half the Rams filled it up. They shot 64.5 percent from the field, including 4-for-5 from 3-point range. They added 13-for-14 foul shooting.
“Our offense was fine all day,” said Livingstone center Rodney Gidney,who led the Bears with 23 points, “but then in the second half, our intensity on defense dropped off. We stopped getting out on the shooters.”
“It came down to stamina,” said Livingstone guard Sheldon Payne, who has given the team a boost since regaining his eligibility at the semester break. “We stopped getting a hand up on the shooters and they just bombed ’em in. They buried ’em.”
As Payne indicated, fatigue played a huge role. The Rams were like a taxi leaving the Bears at the curb down the stretch. Livingstone played four men more than 30 minutes each, while nine Rams received double-figure minutes.
Livingstone coach Buck Joyner, a Winston-Salem native, started his five seniors and they came out of the blocks with plenty of energy.
“At the start, we were the aggressive team and we were playing harder,” said Gidney.
And the Rams were no doubt still thinking about that loss to Smith, which is coached by Steve Joyner, Buck’s brother.
Livingstone scored the game’s first six points. Then after slipping behind 11-10, the Bears ripped off 10 straight, including an alley-oop jam by Peter Anders.
The Bears’ lead crested at 25-13 after Shawn Wiseman ripped a 3-pointer and Payne found Anders with a crisp no-looker for a layup.
But the rest of the half belonged to coach Rick Duckett’s Rams. Winston-Salem picked up the defense and the Bears struggled. Livingstone was outscored 18-5 to trail by a point at the half.
The Bears went to intermission, kicking themselves over their 14 turnovers. Had they taken a bit better care of the ball, they had played well enough to have put together a nice lead.
“We got a good effort from our five seniors. They played well as a unit,” said Joyner. They look like they want to go out with a bang. They played together. No one was going solo.”
Gidney had scored only six points in the first half, but in the second, his teammates started finding him open on the inside.
“When they (Winston) played us man-to-man, my teammates set good picks for me,” said Gidney. “When they played zone, all we had to do was reverse the ball and they had a guard on me and I just sealed him off.”
The guard who often found himself trying to stop the 6-foot-7 Gidney was 6-2 Marcus Best, who is billed as the Minister of Defense. Best picked up four quick fouls trying to contain Gidney, who started racking up points.
The Bears were only down three, 39-36, five minutes into the second half.
It was 41-36 with 14:30 remaining when Joyner tried to give his starters a break. A little more than a minute later, the Bears trailed by a dozen at 48-36. Ram forward Kevin Henry actually threw in an off-balance shot while being fouled to finish the run, even as the Bear starters were hustling to the scorer’s table.
The Bears edged back to 48-40 on a Gidney jumper at 12:18, but never got closer.
The Rams steadily built the lead to as many as 25 points as Rob Williams (17 points) and Kamal Oliver (15) rained jumpers and Corey Thompson (15) and KevinHenry (15) scored at will inside against exhausted Bear defenders.
“We’ve come a long way, but this was a lot like many of our other games,” sighed Jordan. “We get the kind of start we want, then we fizzle.”
But Gidney promised that the Bears haven’t given up on the season. “Coach says there’s a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow,” he said. “We’re getting closer to it. If we can just get that first win in the league, we might just run off eight or nine in a row.”
NOTES:Joyner got good play off the bench from Johnny Moses, who scored five points and had five assists. Outside of Moses, the bench did not have a good day, with only two points and seven turnovers. ... Anders (13 points), Wiseman (12), who made the Bears’ only three 3-pointers, and Payne (11) also reached double figures. ... Salisbury High’s former football and basketball player Justin Johnson was in the Rams’ pep band. ... The Bears hadn’t played in 10 days.
LIVINGSTONE (67) — Gidney 23, Anders 13, Wiseman 12, Payne 11, Moses 5, Henry 2, Rouse 1, Nash, Lynch, Scarborough, Wright.
WINSTON-SALEM STATE (88) — Williams 17, Thompson 15, Oliver 15, Henry 15, Best 8, Tucker 6, Maynard 6, Wooten 4, Breland 2, McIntyre, Ward, English.
Livingstone 30 37 — 67
Winston-Salem State 31 57 — 88
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