Belfast Star’s inconsistency in the All-Ireland Super League continued when they suffered a 96-85 defeat away from home to UCD Marian on Sunday.
Star had edged the first quarter 25-22 with American Darweshi Hunter scoring 15, but after a poor second quarter, they were unable to really threaten the Dublin side, for whom Lovre Tvrdic top scored with 22 points.
Hunter finished with 26 points and eight rebounds, Deondre Jackson had 19 and Max Richardson ended with impressive stats of 17 points and 13 rebounds.
The defeat pushed Star, who have two games in hand, out of the top eight Play-Off spots and Marian moved into eighth on points difference.
Star coach Sean Ingle commented afterwards: “I don’t think that we were cohesive enough as a group offensively, and credit must go to Marian because they did a great job on us defensively.
“It was a game where I felt we really missed the injured Conor Quinn as our point guard but also his leadership as our captain out on the court because we came under a lot of pressure and just didn’t know how to respond.
“We need to regroup because we can’t allow teams to dictate how we play.
“To be honest, it probably should have been a 20-point game because they also missed a few open opportunities.
“We also gave up too many offensive rebounds. They had 18 to our six, so that’s 12 extra shots in their favour just with that.
“We have two big games against Vincent’s coming up and they are both must-win to make sure we are in the Play-Offs at the end of the regular season.”