The St. Joe's men's basketball team hosts the Fordham Rams on Wednesday night at Hagan Arena (7 p.m.) in an Atlantic 10 Conference tilt, as the Hawks look to rebound from a loss to Charlotte that had coach Phil Martelli searching deep within himself for answers.
St. Joe's surrendered a 7-2 run during the last two minutes against Charlotte on Saturday to fall, 57-52, and experience their first home loss this season (7-1). Carl Jones scored 14 points to lead the Hawks and Halil Kanacevic added 12 points and seven rebounds, but Martelli thought his team could use improvement in every facet of the game.
"We got exactly what we deserved and I'm concerned about it because that is a week of bad basketball. Four of the last five halves, we've scored under 30 points. There's going to be a lot of soul searching starting with me. Not starting with them, starting with me," said Martelli. "There is no aspect of the game where I would say we looked really sharp. Even when we got the lead, possessions were too long, too much banging the ball. They were an aggressive team had 19 free throws in the second half to four (for us). Against the home team, that never happens. We've been making shots all year and we didn't make shots."
Fordham (7-8) followed a surprise victory against ranked Harvard with consecutive losses against Massachusetts and Xavier to begin its Atlantic 10 Conference slate. The Rams are led by Chris Gaston, who averages 16.3 points and 11.3 rebounds.
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