Woes grow for Charlotte 49ers with loss to Memphis

CHARLOTTE ATHLETICS

Jaehshon Thomas paced Charlotte with 18 points against Memphis on 4-of-6 shooting from three-point range, but it wasn't enough to prevent the 49ers from a 77-68 loss that dropped them to 0-6 in AAC play.

Charlotte 49ers’ losing streak is up to seven games.

The 49ers (7-12, 0-6 AAC) trailed No. 18 Memphis by 19 with under four minutes to play in a 77-68 loss at Halton Arena but fought their way back to a single digit deficit but it was too late. Down 19 points with under four minutes to play, the Charlotte men’s basketball team didn’t throw in the towel.

“They made a couple of shots down the stretch, and [we] didn’t close the gap quite enough,” Charlotte coach Aaron Fearne said. We’ve kind of been in those situations in conference play where close-ish games turn out to be a bigger defeat than what it really is. That was the only thing really. It was probably just a little too far away.”

When Charlotte made runs in the second half, Memphis found ways to stretch the lead, which Fearne believes out of their personality.

“I’ve talked with the guys a lot recently about just playing in character,” he said. “We have some guys that play out of character at the wrong times. What I mean by that is you have to do what you do well and not think that you can go do things that you’re not capable of doing because it just digs the hole deeper.”

Despite the 49ers being winless in conference games, Memphis coach Penny Hardaway feels it is only a matter of time before he gets things going in the right direction.

“Coach Fearne is one of the best coaches in the country,” Hardaway said. “Last year’s team was ridiculously great with so much talent and, then you can tell they had a lot of guys leave [via the transfer portal]. We know who those guys are. [Lu’Cye] Patterson is at Minnesota, [Igor] Milicic is at Tennessee and [Dishon] Jackson is at Iowa State. They are all doing well for their respective teams. But as of this year’s team, they’re going to put it together.”

To Hardaway’s point, Fearne alluded to the benefit of continuity for several seasons to build culture and develop players. In a more transactional era of college basketball, it happens less often.

“You learn a lot from that, as a lot of our guys will, and now you’ve got to go apply it and learn from past experiences,” Fearne said. “I'm big on that, because, as I said in the locker room afterwards, unfortunately, this landscape is very transactional these days, and that sucks. You want it to be transformational, where you spend a lot of time with guys and help them really grow, and help them get to their potential, as you would typically back in the days. That’s not like that. Now you’ve got to transform quickly, and some are and some aren’t quite there yet.”

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