FORT WAYNE – In the somber mood of the moment, IPFW men’s basketball coach Tony Jasick didn’t want to hear about finest hours or moral anything.
For the better part of 40 minutes, his Mastodons outplayed the Summit League regular-season champions on Wednesday and didn’t win.
Oral Roberts did, 75-71.
“Moral victories don’t get you very far,” Jasick said. “But I will say this: Heading into the last two weeks of the year, our team is playing its best basketball.”
And there’s where the frustration dwells. The 2011-12 season is running out. IPFW (10-16, 4-12 Summit League) has three games left, two of which are road conference games that Jasick deemed must-win in order to qualify for the postseason tournament next month.
“They won by four,” Jasick said. “What we did do is, I think, we proved to ourselves where we’re at competitively. It’s unfortunate that it’s February whatever it is, and I think we’re finally coming to that realization of how good we can be.”
How good was IPFW on Wednesday?
It led the 45th-ranked team in the most recent RPI ratings by three at the half and by eight with 11:50 left when junior swingman Frank Gaines converted a three-point play to send the Mastodons ahead 56-48.
Gaines finished with 28 points, four more than Oral Roberts’ leading scorer Warren Niles.
“They didn’t play like a team that lost nine out of 10 games,” Oral Roberts coach Scott Sutton said. “That’s a credit to Tony and his staff and their kids. It’s never easy up here. I expected a tough game.”
And he got one. But the Golden Eagles, making their final scheduled visit into Fort Wayne since they will be entering the Southland Conference next season, took advantage of Mastodons errors and errant shots and outscored them 18-6 over nearly an eight-minute stretch.
The result was a carbon copy of the January game against ORU in Tulsa, where IPFW led by one at the half, then let it slip away; and of recent losses to IUPUI and Chicago State.
“We’re trying to get into the tournament no matter what, and this definitely would’ve helped our case,” Gaines said. “Moral victories don’t put ‘Ws’ on the board, so we’ve got to go out and get these next two wins – or three.”
And as for Trey McCorkle, whose drive to the basket gave IPFW its largest lead at nine (51-42), the loss was tough to take.
“This one hurts,” he said. “Played four years here, and enjoyed every game.”
Note: All four graduating seniors started in McCorkle, Jason Smeathers, John Peckinpaugh and Antwaun Boyd.
