Rhody GUTS Georgie Porgie
On this last day of January in 2015, with 7,097 fans in attendance, the Ryan Center was as close to being sold-out as it had been besides the Nebraska game. The student body filled up every single seat in the available student sections, especially with it being Greek Day (or something like that). The new students in attendance were a welcome sight, considering that there always seems to be a few guys from fraternities who start the hype and trash talk for the Rhody students, given certain influences.
Early on in this pivotal conference battle, the Rams rode the momentum of the crowd and a couple of their stars, Jared Terrell and Hassan Martin. At halftime, the URI Rams held a 28-19 advantage following some stellar defense. Unluckily for the team from Kingston, a slow start to the second half continued to burden them. Using a 23-9 run thanks to massive trey's by Kevin Larsen and Yuta Watanabe in the middle of the second half, GW took a commanding 48-43 lead with 5 and a half minutes left. Despite GW's coach and Yuta Watanabe crying in the first half after a little paper cut on Watsnabe's face, one thing was evident; the kid from Japan could ball.
With URI clearly on the ropes, #32 in white and navy came to the rescue as he had all season. Picking Joe McDonald's pocket after the big GW run, he laid a dunk down that gave the home team their swagger back. From there, URI used their tight defense and strong drives to the hoop to take full control of the game back. Thanks to TJ Buchanan icing the game from the free throw line, going 6 for 6, URI closed out a brutal battle, with a score of 59-55. Thanks to this win, Rhode Island remained a half game (7-2) behind VCU for the lead in the conference.
I guess the George Washington Colonials LITERALLY needed George Washington to pull this victory off. I mean after all, for the first President of the United States, BALL IS LIFE.
