Box Score
LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Manhattan gave a hard-fought effort in its season opener at Louisville (1-0) on Sunday falling 79-51 to college basketball's second ranked team before 20,921 fans at the KFC Yum! Center. Louisville guard Russ Smith led all players with 23 points, while Rhamel Brown delivered his eighth career double-double with 18 points and 15 rebounds for Manhattan (0-1). The Jaspers were without the services of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference's (MAAC) reigning scoring champion George Beamon (19.0 ppg) who missed the contest due to an injury.
It was a homecoming for Steve Masiello who spent six years as an assistant on the Louisville bench under Rick Pitino prior to taking the head coaching position at Manhattan last year. The short-handed Jaspers just could not keep pace with the Cardinals who had three players in double-figures, including 10 points apiece from Big East Preseason Player of the Year Peyton Siva and sophomore Kevin Ware. Siva also finished with a double-double dishing out 10 assists in the contest.
The Jaspers managed to stay within single digits of the Cards through the first half, despite struggling with their shooting and turnovers out of the gate. Manhattan offset a 1-for-10 effort from the field and 13 turnovers in the first 12 minutes with its defensive energy. The Jaspers forced Louisville into nine of its 12 turnovers in the first 20 minutes to enter intermission trailing the Cards by nine points.
Jaspers' sophomore guard RaShawn Stores scored seven of Manhattan's 19 first half points in his Jasper debut. Manhattan earned numerous trips to the free-throw line where it scored eight of its last 10 points of the stanza, narrowing the Cards' lead that grew as large as 13.
Manhattan could not capitalize on two offensive possessions in the last two minutes before intermission that would have made it a two possession ballgame. The momentum swing came on the Jaspers' 16th first half turnover with four seconds left that led to sophomore forward Chane Behanan's break away lay up at the buzzer to go ahead 28-19.
Smith had 12 of his 23 points with three 3-pointers in the first half to lift the Cards in the absence of Big East Preseason First Team center Gorgui Dieng. The 6'11" 245-pound native of Senegal played only three minutes in the half because of foul trouble. Smith finished with four 3s and swiped five steals in 31 minutes of action.
Dieng went to work early in the second half, scoring seven of his nine points to help Louisville open a 40-23 lead at the 15:24 mark. Louisville hit 51.4% (19-37) of its shots in the stanza to maintain a double digit lead the rest of the way.
Junior guard Luke Hancock knocked down two of Louisville's five treys in the second half to finish with eight points. Behanan also contributed eight points, along with a team-high nine rebounds in 24 minutes off the bench.
Junior point guard Michael Alvarado was the second Jasper who scored double figures. Alvarado scored 11 of his 13 points in the second half and went 9-for-10 from the free-throw line.
Brown was a bright spot for Manhattan giving the team 33 strong minutes in the post. He shot 7-for-13 from the field and his 15 rebounds were a career best.
Manhattan travels to Harvard next to face its second straight opponent that won more than 25 games last year and appeared in the NCAA Tournament. The Jaspers and Crimson square off on Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Lavietes Pavilion.
