It was a tale of two halves between the Knights and Ospreys on a Wednesday night in Jacksonville, FL. UNF, coming off two straight wins on the road, was looking to make it four wins in their last five matchups. On the other side, Bellarmine was coming off two tough losses at home and were a hungry team looking to get back on track.
UNF came out sluggish and they were poor defensively the entire first half, and Bellarmine capitalized on that. The Knights shot 20-of-37 from the field, 7-of-14 from deep, and dished out 16 first half assists. The Knights jumped out to a 21 point lead in the first half and lead by 19 at halftime.
The second half was a completely different story for UNF on both sides of the ball. UNF held Bellarmine to 2-of-12 shooting from behind the arc and 9-of-29 shooting from the field in the second half as they tightened up on the perimeter. During the last 8:34 of the second half, UNF went on a 30-14 run and cut it to a one possession game, but it was all for nothing as the Ospreys lost 70-73.
CJ Fleming of the Knights proved to be too much for the Ospreys, scoring a game-high 25 points. Simply, key injuries to Carter, Hendricksen and Jose Placer were detrimental to UNF.
We asked UNF Head Coach Matthew Driscoll about the key reason UNF did not execute in the last few minutes. Driscoll said the following:
“Free throws. We shot 22-of-33 from the free throw line and you are not going to win games like that. I tell these guys there will be five to seven games a season that will come down to free throws, and we have lost five games at home by one possession.”
UNF will look to bounce back as they hit the road for one game and they will take on Kennesaw State this Saturday.
(Featured image by OspreyMBB/Twitter)