Time is running low on UWM after falling to 7-11 in Horizon League play
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One step forward, another step back.
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The Milwaukee Panthers’ tumultuous, up-and-down run through Horizon League play continued on Feb. 20 at Detroit Mercy, with a strong first half followed by a slow final period on offense that led to a 91-86 loss.
Inconsistency has been the name of the game for the Panthers on their way to a 7-11 conference record with only two games left. Coming off consecutive wins for the first time since December, they held a lead at half against a team in the top five of the standings, facing a chance to take another stride forward heading into the Horizon tournament.
Instead, the Titans turned the tide over the final 20 minutes. Orlando Lovejoy scored 20 of his 24 points in the second half and a 15-2 run midway through the period proved to be the difference.
"We knew coming out in the second half that Lovejoy would try to take the game over and, credit to him, he played a heck of a second half," Panthers head coach Bart Lundy said.
Milwaukee trailed by eight at the under-four timeout but cut the deficit to two with 2:28 to play on a pair of Stevie Elam threes. But a triple by TJ Nadeau, who scored 25 points for Detroit, pushed the advantage back to six and that was effectively the end of the story for the Panthers.
Milwaukee shot 59.4% in the first half as a late surge gave it a 48-42 lead going into the locker room, but scored only 22 points in the first 16 minutes of the second half. Detroit Mercy, meanwhile, shot 60% from the field in the second half.
"They picked on matchups and they got Lovejoy to his spots," Lundy said. "We tried different matchups and he went at every matchup that we had."
Elam, playing in front of a big crowd of friends and family roughly 70 miles from where he went to high school in Adrian, scored 14 of his team-high 22 points in the final four minutes, while Chandler Jackson had 13 points and Amar Augillard added 11.
"He's a fighter," Lundy said of the freshman Elam. "He kept coming and didn't play as well early. He had all his people here and really had a great second half. He made all those plays to keep it close."
All that remains in the regular season for the Panthers is a road tilt with Oakland on Feb. 22 and senior night against Youngstown State Feb. 25.
Milwaukee still remains a half-game ahead of Cleveland State for 10th place, which would keep it from having to play IU Indy in the play-in game.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Time is running low on UWM after falling to 7-11 in Horizon play