KINGSTON, R.I. (WPRI) – After leading the league for much of the season, the Lady Rams find themselves chasing reigning Atlantic 10 champion UMass after their 78-57 loss to the Minutewomen Thursday night.
“We didn’t do us today and that’s a credit to UMass. I give them full credit,” said Rhode Island head coach Tammi Reiss. “We didn’t defend and we didn’t rebound and you’re not going to win a big game if you don’t do that on your home floor. We’ve got to regroup. We really do. It’s one game and we can’t let what happened last year happen this year. It’s one game.”
Last season, the Rams were in a similar position, fighting for the top spot in the conference against Dayton. Rhody ended up losing three of its final five games.
A year later, Reiss hopes to use that lesson to motivate her team during the final week of the regular season.
“You know it’s not about wins, so we’re not going, ‘oh, we have to win.’ No. We’ve got to fix 21 o-boards. We gave up 78 points. Our offensive execution was not good. Those are the things you focus on is getting the team regrouped and refocused,” she said. “We have to learn from this and we’ve got to be ready to play big games. We have to.”
The Rams are on the road Sunday to take on St. Joseph’s at 2 p.m.
