THUNDER BAY – Manny Furtado isn’t sure what went wrong Friday night.
His Lakehead Thunderwolves couldn’t shoot, but that wasn’t at the heart of the problem, the third-year coach said.
It went deeper than that.
“They had a bad week of practice, I told them what was going to happen and it did,” said Furtado, after his team were shellacked 76-50 by the visiting Algoma Thunderbirds at the C.J. Sanders Fieldhouse, a game that saw them out-shot, out-rebounded and out-hustled.
“For us, I think we just didn’t show up. The effort wasn’t there. We didn’t execute shots. We turned over the ball. It was just one of those ugly games.”
From the ugliness, Furtado hopes to find something positive, especially after a fourth quarter that saw the Wolves outgunned 21-5 down the stretch.
“You’ve got to use this as a learning experience. You can’t come out in front of your home crowd and have an effort like we did tonight and expect anything. Not in our conference, not every night against the OUA,” Furtado said.
“Versus the top teams in the country, it’s going to be a lot uglier than that. We’ve got to look at some film, see what we need to improve on. Obviously tonight was a lot, but I don’t think you need film to tell you what your effort was.”
Not once did the Thunderwolves hold a lead on the Thunderbirds, who jumped in front 10-2, lead 22-16 after one and withstood LU’s best surge late in the second to carry a 35-30 lead into the half.
Bright spots for Lakehead included guards Kingsey Campbell-Olsen and Lequan Csersi-Hylton, a fourth-year recruit who led his team with 14 points, including 4-for-9 shooting from beyond the arc.
Furtado has especially been enamored with Campbell-Olsen, a second-year forward who had 11 points and six rebounds on Friday night.
“That’s his game right there,” Furtado said. “He finds his spaces well and finishes around the basket, which is nice.”
Pedro Costa was the top Algoma player, burying 19 points to lead all scorers. Callum White hit all four three-pointers he attempted and finished with a dozen.
Up five at the half, Algoma pushed their lead to 11 early in the third, though a Jack Bull bucket drew the Wolves to within five. Nathan Riley ended the comeback bid, draining a pair of three-pointers and the Thunderbirds took a double-digit lead into the fourth, up 55-45.
It was all Algoma from there.
The two teams will tangle again on Saturday afternoon, the game scheduled for a 1 p.m. tip-off. The women’s game will follow to allows the LU men to prepare for their annual lobster dinner fundraisers.
