With 16 seconds left in regulation, NKU trailed 81-78. Robert Morris briefly held possession before committing a turnover, giving the Norse one final opportunity. Donovan Oday quickly capitalized, burying a three-pointer to force overtime.
A lack of rebounding hurt the Norse in overtime, as the Colonials were the first to the glass and outrebounded NKU 7-3. Which propelled Robert Morris to a 92-89 victory.
NKU fell to 14-7 on the year and 6-4 in Horizon League play.
Despite the loss, Donvan Oday had the best performance of his career, dropping a career-high 38 points on 11-18 shooting, including four three-pointers, and added four rebounds, four assists, one block and one steal.
Oday posted the third-highest single-game scoring in NKU Division I history, second-most points ever scored in Truist Arena and fifth-highest points scored off the bench by any player in the country this season.
LJ Wells added 18 points and led the team in rebounding with eight. Dan Gherezgher posted 15 points and grabbed seven rebounds.
NKU’s rim defense has been excellent this year and that continued today. They now rank 24th in the country in block percentage and had six today compared to the Colonials’ one. Tae Dozier led the Norse in blocks with four.
NKU dominated RMU in transition with 30 fast-break points, while the Colonials only had eight
Rebounding was an issue for the Norse throughout the game. They lost the rebound battle 47-37, giving up 18 second-chance points to the Colonials compared to their 11.
NKU shot 42.4% from the floor tonight, while Robert Morris exceeded that, shooting 47.2%. Poor first-half shooting from the Norse at 33.3% gave them the disadvantage at halftime.
From deep, NKU shot just 6-26 (23.1%), which hurt them as they faced an elite three-point shooting team. Robert Morris entered the game shooting 36.1% from beyond the arc, 64th best in the nation, and the Norse had no answers as the Colonials knocked down 11 threes on 39.3% shooting.
Head Coach Darrin Horn credited Robert Morris for their performance tonight, but believes NKU needs to be able to create more shots on offense.
“I thought they (Robert Morris) played ultra aggressive tonight to get to our shooters and I thought our guys did a really poor job of being aggressive to shoot,” Horn said.
“We tell our guys this all the time, it’s Division I basketball and you’re not going to get wide-open layups and wide-open shots a lot. You’re going to have to finish with people around you in the paint and you’re going to have to step in and knock some shots down with people flying at you, and I just don’t think we did a good job of that tonight,” Horn said.