Coming off their win over East Carolina before Christmas and two good days of practice, the UNCW men’s basketball team left their game wrapped up like an unwanted present during the holidays. Instead of showing the 5,208 fans what improvements they had made over last year’s 7-22 finish, they weren’t able to answer the opening bell and could never comeback as they were downed by in-state rival UNC-Greensboro 72-55.

While head coach Benny Moss was quick to give UNCG credit after the game, he said “I’m very disappointed with our performance, I didn’t have us ready to play.” Seniors Todd Hendley and TJ Carter said it fell on the players, that they need to come out ready night in and night out. As a team, no matter who wants to shoulder the blame, the Seahawks were slower to loose balls, less focused on executing, and just plain flat.

For the Spartans (6-4), it was their third consecutive win and third straight over the Seahawks. UNCW suffered their first home loss of the season and now sit perched at 8-5 as they head into conference play this week. On Wednesday (1/2), the Seahawks play at Drexel in Philadelphia before heading home for two CAA games, against VCU (Saturday 1/5) and Hofstra (Thursday 1/10), at Trask Coliseum. The student section should be returning around that time; their absence was felt against UNCG as it seemed the team needed a big pick-me-up from the sixth man more than ever.

UNCG was paced by power forward Kyle Hines who was the Southern Conference’s pre-season player of the year. The senior’s 16 points gave him double digits in 60 consecutive games, the longest streak in the nation. He should wind up finishing his career with more than 2,000 points, 1,000 rebounds and 300 blocks, a feat accomplished by only Derrick Coleman, Tim Duncan, Pervis Ellison, Alonzo Mourning, and David Robinson. Pretty good company.

While Hines did his damage down low, it was UNCG’s ability to hit the three-ball that was the difference in the first half. The Spartans connected on 7-14 from behind the arc, including three in consecutive trips by Mikko Koivisto, the last of which gave them a 27-11 cushion with 8:55 to play in the opening half. The Spartans continued their hot shooting while UNCW could just hit 37% and went into the locker room on the short end of a 43-25 score.

The Seahawks seemed to have a fresh start, as they got a steal and a TJ Carter dunk to start the second half, but the moment of hope was short-lived. Hines answered down at the other end for UNCG and the Spartans extended their lead to 26 points with 14:14 left in the game.

Quite simply, UNCW didn’t shoot well, didn’t take care of the basketball, didn’t execute on offense and despite the fact that they held UNCG to 33% shooting in the second half, they just didn’t look good. They didn’t help their poor shooting by going to the free throw line only four times in the entire game, which was either a result of their inability to get looks in close or the referees prejudices. Choose the first, give the zebras a break.

UNCW was able to make a bit of a run, trimming the Spartan lead to 12 with 5:37 to play after their 13-0 spurt. However, on this night, the Seahawks would not get any closer, and UNCG would pull away and coast to the seventeen point victory. The Seahawks dropped to 1-20 when trailing at the half since the beginning of the ‘06-’07 campaign. Senior forward Todd Hendley led UNCW with 20 points on 9-15 shooting. The rest of the team was 14-46 (30.4%) on the night and the Seahawks scored just three points at the line.

In his post-game press conference, head coach Benny Moss said that they will not forget the loss, but they do need to move on. After looking at the tape and learning from their ways, the Seahawks need to get ready for back-to-back CAA tests this week from Drexel, winners of two-in-a-row, and VCU, winners of five-in-a-row.

- Jesse Jones