Box Score LAHAINA, Maui, Hawai'i – For 36 minutes, Chaminade showed the basketball world that it can again hang with the big names of college hoops. But a scoreless four-minute stretch late proved costly in the Silverswords' 83-68 loss to Minnesota at the Lahaina Civic Center on Wednesday.
The loss extended the Swords' losing streak to three, dropping them to 2-3 on the year. The Golden Gophers improved to 6-2 on the season.
Lee Bailey scored 18 points to lead Chaminade while
Frankie Eteuati tallied season-highs with 13 points, nine rebounds and four blocks.
Kevin Hu added 12 points.
Minnesota was led by DeAndre Mathieu's 17 points and five assists. Malik Smith had 16 for the Gophers.
"Like the Baylor game, we had about 30, 32, 33 minutes of really good basketball. One bad stretch really killed us, one bad four minute stretch," Chaminade head coach
Eric Bovaird said, referring to Minnesota's 11-0 run between the 8- and 4-minute marks of the second half.
The Swords opened the scoring on a 3-point play by Hu 30 seconds into the game, but the Gophers went on a 14-0 run. Chaminade responded on a 5-0 run courtesy of
AJ Mathew, who hit a jumper and a 3-pointer. Minnesota took a 20-11 lead, but a
Frankie Eteuati layup and Bailey's 17-footer from the left wing prompted the Gophers to call timeout as the Swords drew to within five at 20-15.
The Swords continued to fire from long range on Bailey's 24-footer from straight away, followed by
Christophe Varidel's trey from the left wing, bringing CUH to 22-21. Varidel gave CUH the lead at 25-24 with a jumper with 8:45 left in the half, its first since the opening minute.
The lead would change hands several times throughout the first half, then Chaminade took a 35-31 lead on a Bailey basket and
James Harper's three free throws at the 3:51 mark. An Eteuati put-back and Bailey's 3-ball gave the Swords their largest lead of the half at 40-33 with 2:12 left. The Swords led 42-37 at the break, its first halftime lead in the tournament.
"Obviously, the upset was in the back of my mind," Bailey said. "But I know at least for myself, I know just because this is my third Maui now, that being up at any point in time doesn't mean you're guaranteed the (win). I definitely thought we had a chance just from the way we were playing and the things we were doing. Just like Coach said, a couple of minutes really hurt us."
Chaminade came out with a purpose in the second half, hitting four of their first six shots, building its largest lead of the game at 49-40 on an Eteuati free throw with 17:34 left to play. The Gophers slowly chipped away at the Chaminade lead to close to 57-51, but
Tyree Harrison's off-balance tip-in off Mathew's desperation shot to beat the shot clock gave CUH a 59-51 lead with 9:45 left.
But that's when the Swords drought began, igniting the Gophers' 11-0 run in that four-minute span. Minnesota put the game away down the stretch, hitting 7-of-8 shots from the charity stripe to put the game out of reach, dropping CUH to 7-81 all-time in the EA Sports Maui Invitational.
"It's a lot more stressful when you do have that lead because you have to continue to play to win rather than play not to lose," Eteauti said. "And you know the other team doesn't want to be upset, so it does add extra pressure."
The Swords don't have much time to ponder the week, as they return to McCabe Gym and open Pacific West Conference play on Monday when they face Hawai'i-Hilo at 7:30 p.m.
"It's going to make us a better team," Bovaird said. "Our conference run starts next Monday, so we need to prepare and begin our journey on that."
Live streaming audio of the UH-Hilo game will be available on goswords.com.
