The Riverhawks men’s basketball team’s losing streak extended to 13 in a row yesterday after the 82-75 decision to the Northern Virginia Community College Nighthawks.

With this loss, the Riverhawks are 1-14 and the Nighthawks improve to 4-11. Forward Malik Carroll said the team’s lack of chemistry is the reason why the squad has lost 13 in a row. 

“It’s something that we’ve been working on day in and day out,” Carroll, a first-year nursing student, noted. “We’re trying to make it happen and trying to fix it.”

Riverhawks point guard Truth Norton went 8 for 17 with 19 points, four rebounds, an assist and three steals. Carroll went 6 for 13 with 12 points and eight rebounds. Shooting guard Scoob Stroman went 4 for 16 with 12 points, 11 rebounds and five assists. Forward Marquis James added 14.

The Riverhawks shot a team 43.5% from the field and 42.1% from three. The Nighthawks shot a team 48.3% from the field and 27.3% from three.

The Riverhawks led 43-38 after the first half. The team led by as many as seven points in the second half, but were still outscored 44-32.

Riverhawks men’s basketball coach Joe Snowden said the team let the game “slip away. It was ours to win and [it] just slip[ped] away. I got so many freshmen that haven’t concentrated on enough games to win. Right there in games they throw the ball away … and that’s it, they throw their chances of winning away.”

Stroman, a first-year undecided student, said the game was a “tough loss.” 

“We could have pulled through but we couldn’t hit shots,” Stroman said.

Guards Lorenzo Snyder and Byron Scriber led the Nighthawks with 15 points each. Off the bench, forward Rahim Woni went 5 for 6 with 13 points, four rebounds and two blocks. Guard Adric Howe added 11 points and six assists. 

“I felt we played well,” Snyder, a first-year information technology student, said. “Normally we get close by halftime in a lot of games but we finished at the end of the game.”

Nighthawks men’s head basketball coach Mike Abdeljabbar said the game was a “nail biter.”

“We just had a couple breaks at the end,” Abdeljabbar said.” The “technical foul at the end kind of sealed it for us a little bit, but it was [a] well coached and [a] well played game by both teams.”

Abdeljabbar added the squad “keyed in on a couple of their main guys the last couple possessions. They ran deep into the shot clock and we stayed locked in for 30 seconds on multiple possessions toward the end. It allowed us to really create some bad shots. [We] rebound[ed] the ball and we’re able to flip that on the other side of the offense.”

Carroll added the team gave a “really good effort.”

The Riverhawks next game is at home against the Community College of Allegheny County on Jan. 3 at 6 p.m. The Nighthawks next game is on Jan. 11 against the Potomac State College of West Virginia University Catamounts at 7 p.m.