Men's basketball starts 5-0 for the first time in 18 years with 40-point win over Charleston

Photo courtesy of Shane Donaldson

In a triumph that marked the most prominent victory of the season so far, Rhode Island men’s basketball took down the College of Charleston 91-53 on Sunday afternoon.

“[It was] clearly our best performance of the year against the best team that we have played,” URI Head Coach Archie Miller said. “I thought our guys, the last three or four days, really understood the challenge that we had and for the first time in a while, defensively we were on it.”

Fueled by a dominant first half, the Rams’ 45-16 lead after the first 20 minutes of play set them up for success down the stretch. Defensive play was the main strength for Rhode Island to open up the contest, with the Rams forcing the Cougars to start 0-7 from the field.

“It's good to see the tone setting at the jump ball where our road team feels, ‘oh, man. It's going to be a little different today,’” Miller said.

The Rams’ defense swarmed the Cougars from tip-off, and were successful in grounding Charleston through the full 40 minutes. The Cougars shot 34.3 percent from the floor and 9.5 percent from the perimeter, missing their first 17 attempts from distance.

A big defensive presence for the Rams was their center, redshirt-junior Javonte Brown. The seven-footer had a tough test in the paint in guarding the third-best scorer in the country, senior Ante Brzovic. The forward entered the contest averaging 26.4 points per game, but left the game with only four.

“You see the stat sheet and you see [one of] the leading scorers in the nation and you want to prove yourself obviously,” Brown said. “At the end of the day it is all about us in the locker room just trying to handle business.”

Senior guard Sebastian Thomas also made an impact on the defensive end, leading the Rams with three steals on the afternoon. His main impact though, as it has been all season, came on the offensive end. Thomas collected his first double-double of the season, posting 15 points and a season-high 10 assists.

“I finally got one,” Thomas said. “The past couple games, I've been at eight, nine assists, but credit to my teammates for making shots. It's my job to get them the ball. Really them knocking down the shot, putting the ball in the basket. So, credit to them. Great team win, great team effort.”

Even with the 5-0 start, Rhode Island has yet to play a regular season game away from the Ryan Center this season. Next Wednesday, it travels down to Florida to compete in the Jacksonville Classic. Miller said that one of their preseason tests against UConn prepared the Rams for playing on the road.

“The lights were bright, with 10,000 or 8,000 people when we are playing the two-time defending champs, we kind of wanted to see very early on what we would look like in adverse conditions,” Miller said.

The Rams were 3-1 in neutral site games this preseason, sweeping the Baha Mar Summer League in August. Miller stressed that one strength from Sunday will need to translate next week in order to be successful.

“Defense travels,” Miller said. “It’s one message that we are going to have to take down there, you don’t go into those tournaments thinking you are going to shoot it well. You go into there ready to compete.”

The Rams will start off the Jacksonville Classic Nov. 27 when they take on Detroit Mercy in the first of a two-game slate. The game tips off at noon and can be streamed on Ballertv.com.