43
Penguins waste Hain’s career-best 26 in loss
By Curtis Pulliam
Youngstown
If there is one game Youngstown State men’s basketball coach Jerry Slocum doesn’t want to have his team think about ever again, it’s this one.
The Penguins gave up a season-high 96 points and fell to the Oakland Golden Grizzlies 96-80 at the Beeghly Center.
“Worst effort of the year,” Slocum said. “I was very disappointed with our energy.”
Despite receiving a career-high 26 points from forward Bobby Hain, the Penguins were unable to stop the Golden Grizzlies.
“I was obviously not happy with our defensive effort,” Slocum said. “They had a special night at the offensive end.”
The Golden Grizzlies shot a sizzling 60 percent from the field in the first half. They made nine 3-pointers, but Oakland’s inside game was working, too.
Corey Petros scored 21 to lead the Golden Grizzlies.
“He’s a good player,” Hain said. “I would say he’s probably one of the toughest (to guard).”
The Penguins got off to a good start forcing turnovers on the Golden Grizzlies first two possessions, but couldn’t sustain that.
Hain hit a jumper to tie the game at 22 but that was the last tie of the game.
The Golden Grizzlies started heating up from behind the arc, with back-to-back 3’s from freshman guard Nick Daniels to make it 33-27 at the 7:30 mark.
The Penguins battled through nine turnovers offensively and were down 49-42 at half.
“It’s hard, we came in (the locker room) and had our energy going,” Hain said. “We felt like we had momentum and shots weren’t dropping through.”
But the Penguins’ cold shooting sparked an 11-2 run to begin the second half for the Golden Grizzlies increasing their lead to nine. The Golden Grizzlies pushed their lead to a game-high 20 points on a 3-pointer by forward Tommy McCune.
The Golden Grizzlies (11-12, 6-2 Horizon League) never lost the lead in the second half.
“It was a team that scared us and we knew if we were going to compete for the league title, we would have to win here,” said Oakland head coach Greg Kampe. “I thought that we really executed our offense well.”
Sophomore guard Kahlil Felder added 19 points, seven assists and seven rebounds.
Felder was the freshman of year in the Horizon League last season.
“I think he has developed and grown,” Kampe said. “I think he has taken the leadership role on. He’s creating plays for us.”
The Penguins drop to 10-15, and 1-9 in the Horizon League.
Kampe feels the Penguins are better than their record indicates.
“He’s got a young team,” Kampe said of Slocum. “Jerry’s having growing pains but he’s doing a great job with them. They’re battling.”
Hain said the Penguins will keep working.
“We just have to keep trying to get better everyday in practice,” he said. “Everybody has to keep their emotions intact and just try to get better.”
For Slocum, it was all about the lack of energy on both ends.
“First time in a long, long time that I wasn’t very happy tonight in terms of what our effort was,” Slocum said. “We have obvious limitations in our skill level at times, but we have always played hard. And I didn’t think we did that tonight.”