ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — With 13:20 remaining in the first half of the MAAC Quarterfinal on Saturday, Marist men’s basketball trailed Quinnipiac 19-11. The Bobcats were on a 7-2 run, and by that point, sophomore guard Justin Menard had three turnovers and had already been subbed out for a couple of minutes by Marist head coach John Dunne.
“He started the game so excited and [the] turnovers,” Marist head coach John Dunne said. “And then he forgets it all.”
Behind Menard’s clutch gene, Marist squeaked past Quinnipiac 77-75 in a thrilling MAAC Quarterfinal win that came down to the final possession. Menard had 26 points, tied his season high with five 3-pointers and made four massive jumpers in the final five minutes, including two 3-pointers in the final 2:06, to lift Marist past the Bobcats.
“He’s probably the most mentally tough player I’ve ever coached,” Dunne said of Menard. “He can’t dunk, [he has] average lateral quickness, teams go after him… and [he] just balls down the stretch, and he’s done this a number of times this year.”
Between Menard’s makes, sophomore forward Parby Kabamba also drilled a huge 3-pointer. Then, trailing by two with 10 seconds remaining, Quinnipiac brought the ball up the floor with a chance to tie or take the lead. Freshman guard Tai Turnage penetrated towards the basket before senior forward Jaden Daughtry swatted his shot away to secure the Marist victory.
Junior guard Jadin Collins-Roberts — who has built a penchant for performing well in the playoffs — matched his season high with 19 points and his career high with 11 rebounds. He took 20 shots, five more than he had ever attempted in his career.
“It’s just something that comes out of me during a high-intensity game… when it’s game time, and the lights are on,” Collins-Roberts said.
Despite a slow start, Marist entered halftime having outscored the Bobcats 31-13 since trailing 19-11.
Senior forward Trace Salton made a couple of second-chance tip-in layups that narrowed the deficit to five entering the under-12 media timeout. Immediately after the timeout, Collins-Roberts buried a right-wing triple to even the game before he capped a 10-0 run by slamming home a ferocious jam two possessions later following a Blackwell steal.
With 6:52 left in the first, Menard drew a foul on a 3-point try as the shot clock wound down. He made all three free throws, which helped the Red Foxes withstand a run of nearly three minutes without a field goal until he assisted a Collins-Roberts jumper to go ahead by four.
Menard then scored five consecutive points on the ensuing two possessions to cap a 9-1 Marist run with a 34-25 lead. The Red Foxes kept building from there — freshman forward Myles Parker grabbed two consecutive offensive rebounds before he finished a lay-in to go ahead 40-28.
In the second half, the Bobcats slowly chipped away and cut the deficit to four with 16:27 to go. Once again, Menard had a response — he drilled his second 3-pointer to bring the lead back to seven. Following a 3-pointer by sophomore forward Grant Randall, his third in three attempts, the Bobcats had the Red Foxes back within four.
The second half continued with physical basketball as Quinnipiac looked to keep the Red Foxes close. With Marist on offense, Salton fouled Randall hard — following a review, the officials charged Salton with a flagrant two foul and ejected him from the game.
Following the foul, Randall caught fire.
Randall already had five straight points for the Bobcats before the foul. Immediately after it, he made four consecutive free throws to even the game, the second pair of which came following a foul by Kawa, Marist’s seventh of the half, to put Quinnipiac in the bonus with 12:23 remaining. Then, Randall made yet another triple to put Quinnipiac back in front 53-51 — on the next trip down the floor, he put back a Monroe missed layup to go ahead by four.
As the clock ticked down, Marist and Quinnipiac played tug-of-war. After trailing for a bit over three minutes, the Red Foxes went back in front with 4:32 to go on a Menard triple — the first of his red-hot run to close the game. The Bobcats went back in front briefly before Kabamba’s triple. Monroe then tied the game, but Menard responded again by putting Monroe on the ground and knocking in a mid-range jumper.
Menard then hit his two biggest shots, a pair of 3-pointers to put the Red Foxes ahead 73-67 with 1:27 remaining.
The Red Foxes withstood a 4-point play by Randall that cut the deficit to one before Daughtry’s block sealed the win. A MAAC All-Defensive Team selection, Daughtry did not score but proved vital on the defensive end, just as he did all season.
“He’s a winner, I think personally he should have been defensive player of the year,” Menard said of Daughtry. “We’re the number one defense, and he’s our best defender; he’s made plays like that all year.”
Marist will face No. 1 Merrimack tomorrow at 6 p.m. The Red Foxes lost both of their regular-season matchups with the Warriors.
“We’re gonna be confident, we’re gonna fight, we’re gonna scrap — same mentality as today,” Dunne said.
Edited by Ben Leeds
Graphic + Photo by Jaylen Rizzo
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