The Massachusetts Women’s basketball team’s poor offensive display was too much to overcome in a 56-50 loss to the Army Black Knights on Saturday afternoon. The Minutewomen now fall to 2-4 on the season.

Army came into Amherst on a mission to extend their five-game win streak to six, which is exactly what they did. The Black Knights got a 12-point lead with five minutes to go in the fourth quarter. Slowly, UMass chipped away at the lead by forcing turnovers. After Army was called for an offensive foul, Allie Palmieri drained a three to cut it to five with two minutes to go. 

“We need to play with a sense of urgency for 40 minutes, let’s be honest,” head coach Mike Leflar said. “We’re not talented enough to not and even if we were talented enough to not, I’d be embarrassed if we didn’t play with [urgency] for 40 minutes, so you can imagine my feelings and thoughts on our effort in our performance.”

Palmieri came up big again making another three to cut the lead to two with 19 seconds to go in the game. Ultimately, her performance would not be enough as Army prevailed at the free throw line to win their sixth game in a row. Palmieri achieved a new career high in points with 21 shooting 5-of-17 from the field, 50 percent from three while making 7-of-8 free throws. 

https://x.com/UMassWBB/status/1860411609627214093

The senior guard was the only player on UMass to provide consistent scoring on offense. After a good performance against Holy Cross on Wednesday, Stefanie Kulesza struggled against Army. Kulesza finished with four points shooting 1-of-8 from the field, and didn’t score a field goal until the third quarter. 

Yahmani McKayle was another player who struggled with her shot. After going 4-of-14 against Holy Cross, McKayle followed that up shooting 3-of-17 from the field and 1-of-6 from three. 

UMass shot 25 percent from the field and 29 percent from three. Army had the upper hand in every offensive measure, besides free throws. Army missed 11 free throws and shot 52 percent from the line, if they made a few more, UMass may have been blown out. 

Additionally, the Minutewomen usually thrive with points in the paint, but they could not get their offense going down there. UMass shot a season-low, only scoring 14 points in the paint due to missed layups and Army’s defensive intensity. 

“I thought we were too slow, and we did get paint touches early in the game, [but we were] too slow to make moves,” Leflar said. “There was no offensive flow … I’m tired of being like oh we’re getting layups like keep getting them they’ll fall, I’m kind of past that, so want to play through the post have to understand what happens when people are digging off or doubling and unfortunately we didn’t today.”

This relates to UMass falling into scoring droughts during portions of the game. The Minutewomen fell into this theme last year, and it has seemed to overlap with this year’s team. While Palmieri has proven she can be the leading scorer for the team, she simply can not do this alone. 

Players such as Lilly Ferguson have given UMass some energy off the bench. She scored four points and secured 13 rebounds against Army. There needs to be some consistency and effort from other players not named Allie Palmieri.  

https://x.com/UMassWBB/status/1860401687938351220

Defensively the Minutewomen were not any better allowing Army to shoot 50 percent in the first half. Army was able to get out to an 8-0 run to start the game. UMass responded with a 14-4 run to end the quarter to take a two-point lead to the second quarter. The Minutewomen would lose control of the game after taking a 17-14 lead with Army outscoring them 15-7 to take a five-point lead into the break.

In the second half, UMass’ defensive intensity was better, holding Army to shoot 32 percent, and they did not allow Army to score a field goal in the last five minutes of the game. However, the Minutewomen failed to keep Army’s Trinity Hardy in check. It was the Hardy show in Amherst, as she scored 20 points and shot 8-of-17 from the field. Hardy grabbed eight boards and led the team in assists with four. 

“[Hardy] played with a lot of confidence,” Leflar said. “The ones that really bother me are the ones where we had her stopped and we stopped playing, happened twice in the first half … couple in the second half she rebounds her own miss or she gets a 50/50 ball and we have her stopped … those are the plays that you try and explain to the team on film that have to make the difference … unfortunately we didn’t today and that’s what we needed to do to beat [Army].”

UMass will be on the road next to take on Siena College on Sunday, Dec. 1 at 2 p.m. in Loudonville, New York.