Philadelphia, Pa. – There's a new sport being contested at this year's Winter Olympics. It's called ski mountaineering, also known by its shortened name, skimo, which involves athletes climbing up a mountain and skiing down it. That's what tonight's game felt like for the Fordham men's basketball squad. The first half seemed as if they were climbing a mountain as Saint Joseph's hit nine three-pointers over the first 20 minutes as the Hawks took a 42-32 halftime lead. But the Rams seemed to have reached the apex of the mountain at halftime and flew downhill in the second half as Fordham upended Saint Joseph's 68-64 in an Atlantic 10 game at Hagen Arena.
With the win, Fordham improves to 13-12 overall, 4-8 in the Atlantic 10, while Saint Joseph's falls to 15-10 overall, 7-5 in the conference.
Junior forward
Rikus Schulte led the Rams with 19 points and he grabbed eight rebounds while senior guard
Christian Henry added 17 points and four assists and redshirt freshman forward
Abass Bodija recorded a double-double with 12 points and a game-high ten rebounds. Grad student guard
Dejour Reaves also finished in double figures with eleven points.
How it Happened
• Fordham trailed by as many as 15 in the first half, 42-27, with just over a minute left but managed to score five points over the final minute to cut the deficit to ten at the break, 42-32.
• The Rams opened the second half with an 8-1 run to make it a three-point game, 43-40, on a Reaves driving layup just over two minutes into the half.
• Later in the half, the Hawks took a 53-46 lead when Fordham scored ten straight points to seize a 56-53 lead with 8:13 to go in the contest.
• The Rams led the rest of the way but by no more than three until Henry hit a three-pointer with 37 seconds remaining to give Fordham a 65-59 lead.
• Saint Joseph's managed to get the Fordham lead down to two, 66-64 with nine ticks left but Bodija hit two free throws with eight seconds left to clinch the game.
Notes
•
Dejour Reaves has scored in double figures in all 24 games he has appeared in this year.
• The double-double was Bodija's second of the season.
• It was only the second win for Fordham at Saint Joseph's since the Rams joined the Atlantic 10 in 1995.
• Saint Joseph's shot 60.9% (9-15) from behind the arc in the first half but only 6.3% (1-12) in the second.
• The Hawks scored just seven field goals in the second half, the first coming over six minutes into the period.
• Sophomore center
Jack Whitbourn missed his second straight game with] an injury.
• Fordham entered the game leading the Atlantic 10 in scoring defense (65.1) and held the Hawks to ten points below their season average.
• Saint Joseph's entered the game leading the Atlantic 10 in blocked shots (5.1/game) but only had one tonight.
• The Ram outscored the Hawks at the free throw line, 16-12.
By the Numbers
3 – Steals by
Abass Bodija, a season-high.
3 – Atlantic 10 road wins for the Rams.
7 – Turnovers for Fordham, one shy of the season low.
10 – Offensive rebounds for the Rams, the fifth straight and 20th overall game Fordham has recorded double figures in offensive rebounds.
32 – Points in the paint for the Rams.
1,590 – All-time wins for Fordham.
What's Next?
• The Rams continue Atlantic 10 play by traveling to Kingston, R.I., to take on the University of Rhode Island Rams in the Ryan Center on Saturday, February 14, at 12:00 p.m.
• It will be the 78th meeting between Fordham and Rhode Island on the hardwood.
• Rhode Island leads the all-time series, which started in the 1941-42 season, 43-34.
• Fordham won the most recent matchup, a 88-71 victory in the first round of the A-10 Championship last March in Washington, D.C., as
Jackie Johnson III scored 29 points and
Japhet Medor added 26.
• The two teams split a pair of games in the regular season last year with Fordham taking the first meeting, 80-79, on February 5 in the Rose Hill Gym as
Matt Zona put back a
Japhet Medor miss with less than two seconds remaining for the margin of victory, and Rhode Island winning the second, 86-67 in Kingston on March 8 behind 20 points from Sebastian Thomas and 19 from Jaden House.
