By Corey Johns

Once again, a short-staffed UMBC squad stepped out on the court against the down one. For the second time this season UMBC dressed only seven players with Justin Fry out with a right knee injury suffered late in the game against Maine (He should be back for Hartford). Last time that happened UMBC was dominated by Vermont, and this time they desperately needed somebody to step up and carry the team to victory over the New Hampshire Wildcats.

Darryl Proctor continued his monster season with a 23 point, ten rebound night. But not even that was good enough to garner the UMBC player of the game honor. That went to Jay Greene. He scored a career high 34 points (fourth all-time and most by any Retriever in a conference game) with seven rebounds and four assists for an astounding game.

“My shot just felt good. I was in a rhythm and the coaches just said keep shooting,” Greene said. “With Justin out we needed to pick up the scoring a bit and tonight I had a good night and got the win.”

When you are a hot shooter you are a hot shooter. For the majority of the second half no matter what Greene threw out and no matter from how far away the shot came, it went down. He was not to be denied. He knew it too. Once his three sunk for his 34th point he ran back to play defense yelling, “You can’t stop me!”

“I’m not surprised. I’m very high on him and think he’s a phenomenal player—both he and Darryl,” Monroe said while choking back tears. “They just did a superb job tonight. They are just two winners and they weren’t going to let us lose tonight.”

It shouldn’t come to a surprise to anyone that Greene had such a great shooting night. He has the ability to be the leading scorer in the conference if he wants, but he would rather run the floor and set up others to score unless the team needs him to. Last year when Brian Hodges went down Greene netted his previous career high 26 points in Vermont to get a win.

With Fry out Burrier player center (Gilliam actually tipped off though) against Dane Diliegro, one of the top centers in the conference. DiLiegro had a big game with 16 points and 10 rebounds but Burrier was by far the most confident player on the court. He played with absolutely no fear against Diliegro, made him work, and grabbed ten rebounds.

“He just did an exceptional job for us,” Monroe said. “[He] just did what he could do for us. He played hard, he rebounded, he got after it. Brett, Bakari and Jake Wasco really stepped up tonight and showed that they can be key contributors on this program.”

Smith, who this reporter has been really down on lately, showed a lot in the game. He only scored four points but contested every shot defensively and made Tyrone Connelly, who grabbed six points, work for his stats.

It is odd to say, but UMBC may very well be one of the hottest teams in the league right now. They are playing with tremendous amounts of confidence and have won two straight with a possible third against Hartford.

“Any time you can win consecutive game it helps your confidence,” Monroe said. “We know we have to go to Hartford and be prepared for them. I think we will be prepared to play.

“Our guys are confident, they believe in each other, and I think they showed that tonight,” the coach continued. “New Hampshire made a run at us and we didn’t fold, we kept fighting and kept playing. That’s the sign of a team to be reckoned with.”

While the game was within three with under 30 seconds left UMBC did not fall apart, despite giving up their large lead. After Tyrece Gibbs let go the game-tying three the Retrievers set up to rebound it. Matt Spadafora grabbed the rebound, was fouled and ultimately put the game away with both free throws giving UMBC the 81-76 win.

After the game Monroe grabbed the mic to talk to the fans. “How about that effort from the Retrievers?” Monroe asked. “Next Tuesday I expect all of you here against Vermont cheering us on.”

He talked to the crowd before the Binghamton game and it seemed to work, why not now? He loves the crowd that he nick-named the dawg pound, and the crowd loves the way the team is playing right now hitting on all cylinders.