"The Nebraska Game"
Perhaps the largest student attendance in Ryan Center history, a Saturday night showdown featuring the #21 Nebraska Cornhuskers and Rhode Island Rams, brought in 2500 students and packed the arena to standing room only. "Ryan Center staff were giving up their seats in order to let more students in." And boy was it a showdown.
After a low scoring first half for both teams, Rhody went to the locker room down 23-19. The second half however, would write a new page into the URI history books. URI would claim their first lead of the second half 5 minutes in off a three-pointer made by non-other than the star guard EC Mathews. This was a part of a 14-5 run the Rams had started out the second half on to go up 33-28 on the Cornhuskers. Nebraska then had 5-0 a run of their own to knot it up at 33. From here on out, it would become an absolute rock fight between the teams, with neither going ahead by more than 3. With six minutes, left and the Rams down 3, EC Mathews was fouled on a three-point shot attempt and would head to the line.
The star guard showed his ice-cold nerves and knocked down all three to tie it up. With just under two minutes to play EC would be there yet again with a nifty euro-step layup to put the Rams up two. Shavon Shields of Nebraska would grab an offensive rebound off a Hassan Martin swat and put it back in to tie it at 53 with 35 seconds left. Coming off a URI timeout, EC would be the one with the ball and the shot but couldn't get it to go. Hassan was there for the rebound and put it up just as the clock expired. The ball seemed as though it was on the rim for an eternity as it rolled around and fell of the side. This game was headed to overtime.
The Rams started overtime with the ball in their hands and knew what they had to do, score. EC Mathews would grab his own rebound of a blocked shot and would find freshman Jared Terrell just behind him waiting for a pass. After starting off the night 0-3 from the 3-point line, Terrell caught and shot...SWISH. URI started overtime with a 3 pointer to go up 56-53 and the roof of the Ryan Center nearly blew off. They weren't done there.
Shavon Shields would make a couple of free throws off a Gilvydas Biruta foul and cut the lead to one. It was the Rams' turn again. Once again Jared Terrell would deliver, knocking down an ankle breaking, step-back, baseline three to push the lead to 4 in the early minutes of overtime. This time, the insane student section along with the entirety of the Ryan Center blew the roof all the way to the Narragansett Bay. Defense was the next star in the Rams lineup as Nebraska would only make one field goal for the rest of overtime. That field goal? A dunk made by Terran Petteway cut the Rhody lead to only 2 with just 4 seconds left on the clock. The ensuing inbound would fall into the hands of EC Mathews, who had already knocked down 9 free throws in the game. Nebraska immediately fouled and EC would head to the line to shoot 2. Mathews would calmly throw up the first shot and hit nothing but net. The next shot, perhaps the biggest free throw of his young career, with the game in his hands, would find the bottom of the net as well. 100% of the over-capacity crowd were on their feet as Nebraska would have to inbound, down by four, with four seconds left. The Cornhuskers wouldn't even get a shot off before time ran out and Rhody would knock off Nebraska giving Dan Hurley his first win against a ranked opponent at URI.
The students couldn't contain the excitement that the game brought and stormed the court just after the final buzzer; like two rivers colliding from each end of the court. Amidst the mayhem, the URI "Hype man", as he's known as by the Rhody student section, managed to find the Ryan Center's microphone and screamed into it, "RHODY RHODY RHODY!". What seemed like each of the almost 8,000 fans in attendance yelled back, "RAMS RAMS RAMS!" and continued URI's signature call. The entire arena was in a state of pure bliss as the players, students, and fans remained on the court as no one wanted to be the first to leave. This moment marked the "Unofficial start" of Dan Hurley's era at URI and put little Rhody on the NCAA map.
Edited by: An Attendee
