Men’s Basketball Falls at Maryland, 66-50

College Park, Md. (November 20, 2014) - There are many good things the Fordham men's basketball squad can take away from its game tonight with the University of Maryland. The Rams played hard for just about 40 minutes, forced 15 Maryland turnovers and took 15 more shots than the home team. But in the end, Fordham couldn't put the ball through the hoop often enough as the Rams fell to the Terrapins, 66-50, in the Xfinity Center.
 
With the loss, Fordham falls to 1-2 on the season while Maryland improves to 3-0.
 
"They're good. We knew they were good. We had great respect for them. I thought we played really hard considering we didn't have Eric Paschall and Antwoine Anderson," said Fordham head coach Tom Pecora. "The guys played real hard and they competed. A lot of our misses were right there. I think the first five minutes of the second half got them the separation they needed. I think they're very impressive by the way that they all play to their strengths and nobody is trying to do things they can't do. We experimented a little bit with Eric Paschall not here. We played Manny Suarez as a three, He didn't know some of the cuts, which kind of limited what we could do, but with that said it's a good effort. We can build off that."
 

The Rams received some bad news prior to the game when it was announced that freshman guard Eric Paschall, the team's leading scorer, wasn't going to be available for the game as he stayed behind in New York to undergo some medical tests. That meant someone else would have to step up and a quartet of Rams did with Ryan Rhoomes and Mandell Thomas each netting 14 points, Christian Sengfelder scoring eight and Nemanja Zarkovic adding seven points and four assists while committing just one turnover.
 
The game was close over the first 20 minutes with neither team shooting particularly well. Maryland held an 11-5 lead five minutes into the game but the Rams scored six of the next eight points to make it a 13-11 game following a Rhoomes three-point play midway through the half.
 
The Rams got as close as one, 16-15, on a Rhoomes lay in with 4:47 left before Maryland stretched the lead to seven, 23-16, with a 7-1 spurt 2:27 later.  A Jon Severe steal and lay in at the buzzer cut the Fordham deficit to five at the break, 23-18.
 
Maryland opened the second half with the hot shooting hand, hitting its first three shots of the half, two of them three-pointers, to build a ten-point lead, 31-21. A Sengfelder three 2:30 into the second half made it a seven-point game, 31-24, but the Terrapins scored eight unanswered points and the Rams couldn't get the deficit under ten the rest of the way.
 
Rhoomes added seven rebounds to his 14 points while Sengfelder grabbed five boards and Bryan Smith finished with nine rebounds and two assists.
 
The Rams return to action on Sunday, November 23, when they host the UMass Lowell River Hawks in the historic Rose Hill Gym at 6:00 p.m. in a game that will be televised live on SportsNet NY (SNY).
 
Notes
NFL referee Gene Steratore was one of the game officials… Both teams pulled down 38 rebounds but the Rams had the better offensive numbers, grabbing 17 offensive boards which they turned into 14 second chance points…  Maryland has now won the last nine meetings with the Rams… Speaking of Rams, Maryland has one on their roster, Varun Ram (though it's pronounced Rham)… Former Rams Dan Blaine and Mike Cooper were in attendance… Only 12 players dressed for Fordham.