After stumbling through a 1-2 start with too many stretches of sloppy, inconsistent basketball, Mount St. Mary's was due for a good game.
It settled for a good half.
Last night at Loyola's Reitz Arena, the visiting Mountaineers drove coach Jim Phelan crazy with more slipshod work in the first half, as they committed 13 turnovers, missed five of six free throws, and found themselves in a 40-27 hole at the break.
But it was a different Mount team that emerged from the locker room. It made smart passes, grabbed rebounds, hit open shots and free throws, and forced turnovers with pressure defense.
And 51 second-half points later, it also had a win, 78-65, over a stunned Loyola team and 1,203 fans.
"We finally got a good half out of them," said Phelan, whose team will visit Oklahoma, San Francisco and Virginia Commonwealth during the next 10 days. "There was a lot to say at halftime, most of it not repeatable. We questioned their courage. They snapped back. They played the way they are capable of playing."
"For so long, we've been almost there. We knew with this road trip coming up, this was a must win," said Mount guard Silas Cheung, who scored a career-high 15 points and was one of five Mount players in double figures.
The Mount played with a distinctive sense of urgency after halftime, starting with the opening minutes, when forward Matt Meakin (13 points) scored the first five points of the half to cut Loyola's once-comfortable lead to 40-32.
After that, the Greyhounds (3-4) began to lose their composure by doing the things the Mountaineers did early -- throwing the ball away, mostly.
Then again, Loyola had chemistry problems from the outset.
Guard Milton Williams and forward Julian Tate, two key players, violated a team rule yesterday, according to Loyola coach Brian Ellerbe. Williams did not play. Tate played three minutes, when the game already was decided.
Their replacements, junior guard Matt Walker and senior forward Virgil Wallace, performed decently. Walker scored a career-high 12 points and gave Loyola an early lift. Wallace, making his first career start, scored six points and had seven rebounds. But they couldn't stop the more experienced, determined Mountaineers.
"I'm from the old school, where players win games and coaches lose them," Loyola's Ellerbe said. "Maybe I didn't do a good job of getting us excited to play in the second half. We should have been more aggressive, but we were the opposite. We missed a lot of free throws [eight of 19], which didn't allow us to set up our press. And we kept throwing the ball away."
And the Mountaineers grew more confident with each Loyola miscue. Seven-foot center Randy Edney (10 points, 15 rebounds) commanded the boards all night, and his turnaround jumper in the lane gave the Mount a 55-51 with 9:40 left that it never lost.
Chris McGuthrie (team-high 16 points), who battled a stomach virus and came off the bench for the first time in his Mount career, made it 61-53 on a fast-break layup with 7:30 to go.
From there, the Mount pulled away at the foul line, hitting nine of 14 down the stretch.
The Mount shot 60 percent in the second half, mainly off easy shots sparked by its press, with Michael Watson providing a big lift. The senior forward contributed 15 points in 23 minutes on 6-for-7 shooting.
Meanwhile, Loyola wilted badly on offense, managing only 25 points in the second half on 29.6 percent shooting. The Greyhounds made only two baskets in the last nine minutes.
The Greyhounds, with normal benchmates Wallace and Walker starting, weren't bothered early by the change in chemistry. Wallace and Walker combined for Loyola's first 12 points, as the Greyhounds took a 12-4 lead.
During that opening stretch, Walker hit two three-pointers, stole a pass and drove the floor for a layup. His eight points more than doubled his season's production coming into the game.
Mount St. Mary's regrouped over the next two minutes, scoring seven unanswered points.
The Mountaineers cut the lead to 12-11 on an 18-footer by Jeff Balistrere with 15:08 left in the half.
L But the Mount went into a self-destructive shell after that.
0$ Until the second half, at least.