AMHERST - On a day when one guy with Mormon and Boston roots dropped out, another one dropped in.
Former Brigham Young star Danny Ainge arrived at the Mullins Center a few hours after former Governor Mitt Romney bowed out of the presidential race. Continuing a winter in which the Celtics executive director of basketball operations has seen plenty of exciting hoops, Ainge got to see the University of Massachusetts outlast Rhode Island, 78-76, before 6,782 fans.
"The energy level, the sense of urgency, the understanding of what they had to do to win was at the highest level we've had," said UMass coach Travis Ford.
Gary Forbes led UMass with 26 points and hauled down 13 rebounds. Chris Lowe, blazing into the lane with one creative drive after another, matched his career high with 23 points and added six assists. Etienne Brower gave the Minutemen a desperately needed presence against Rhode Island's inside power with 10 points and 17 rebounds.
The win revived UMass's NCAA Tournament hopes. The Minutemen had dropped three of their last four games. Their record now stands at 15-7 overall, 4-4 in the Atlantic 10.
URI (19-4, 5-3) saw its five-game winning streak end. The Rams were led by Will Daniels with 19 points, though he was held to 7-for-21 shooting by Forbes. Parfait Bitee had 17 points with eight assists.
The Rams took their only lead on a put-back by Joe Mbang with 10:51 left for a 55-54 edge.
Forbes responded with a barreling 3-point play, and the Minutemen rode a series of hustle plays to a 69-60 lead with 6:44 remaining.
Rhode Island, capitalizing on UMass's diminished inside strength after Dante Milligan and Tony Gaffney fouled out, managed a late surge, closing to 77-74 when Daniels scored over Forbes with 27 seconds left.
The Rams got the ball back when Brower missed the front end of a one-and-one, but they elected to go for 2 against UMass's overplaying defense, and Keith Cothran's contested drive came up short.
"It was a good play, but you've got to be stronger," said Rhode Island coach Jim Baron. "You've got to attack the bucket."
Forbes hit 1 of 2 free throws with 8.2 seconds left.
Daniels hit on a drive with 0.8 seconds left to cut the lead to 78-76, but after a timeout, Luke Bonner lofted a long inbounds pass into the frontcourt, which allowed time to expire.
"We needed it real bad," said Forbes. "We've got [eight] games left and we're trying to do some special things with this program."
Lowe said the key to victory was a recent speech from Ford, telling the team to lighten up.
"Coach Ford has been preaching that we've been playing tentative and scared and not having fun," Lowe said. "He just told us not to be scared, to go out there and have fun, just play hard. If you make mistakes, you make mistakes."
