Fordham Basketball

Fordham has fired head men's basketball coach Tom Pecora, the school announced in a press release today. It also made its decision public via Twitter:

Fordham Announces Change in Leadership of Men's Basketball Program http://t.co/XIhKheEI6h

— Fordham Athletics (@FordhamRams) March 18, 2015

When contacted by Bleacher Report, Fordham athletic director David Roach declined to comment further.

Pecora had been at Fordham for five years and had a record of 44-106 during his tenure. He had two years remaining on his contract.

In its press release, Fordham explained a bit behind the decision:

The decision was based on the fact that the University’s men’s basketball program has regrettably not achieved the desired results or made the sustained progress hoped for under Mr. Pecora’s leadership, as measured by the won/loss record over five years, which was 44–106 (29.3 percent), and the recruited student-athlete retention rate over the past four years, which was 50 percent." (Fordham later added that the retention rate "does not include the six freshmen on the 2014-2015 roster.")

It's true that the Rams didn't have much success under Pecora. It's also true that no coach has had much success, certainly nothing sustained, since the school joined the Atlantic 10 prior to the 1995 season.

Though he didn't get it going in the Bronx, Pecora has a track record going back to his days at Hofstra when he won 155 games in nine seasons. There's reason to believe that, given more time, he could have gotten it done at Rose Hill.

Even as the losses piled up, Pecora showed an ability to recruit talent. He brought in Eric Paschall, the New England Prep Player of the Year in 2013, who led the Rams in scoring this season and was named A-10 Rookie of the Year; Jon Severe, Mr. New York Basketball in 2013, who as a freshman set a school record by scoring 536 points; and Christian Sengfelder, who was named A-10 Rookie of the Week five times in 2014-15 and made the conference All-Rookie team.

Fordham won 10 games this year with seven freshmen and only three upperclassmen on its roster. It beat George Mason in the first round of the conference tournament, despite the fact that Paschall was hobbled by a high ankle sprain and played just 11 minutes and scored only one point. The next day, with Paschall out, Fordham came within minutes of upsetting VCU, the eventual A-10 champion.

With another year of development under their belt, one would think the Rams would have been a much better team under Pecora next season. For that reason and more, you could make a strong argument that firing him was a bad decision.

Now, the Rams will have to start over again, a familiar position for a university that will employ its fifth coach in the last 16 years. That's not the type of stability you need to be successful in college basketball.

Fordham says it "will launch a national search for a new head men’s basketball coach immediately, and will use the services of a search firm in the process."

Here we go again. It didn't have to be this way.

Charles Costello is a Fordham Rams Featured Columnist for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

Fordham received some welcome news Tuesday when the Atlantic 10 Conference announced its postseason awards.

Eric Paschall, the Rams' leading scorer who is averaging 16.5 points and 5.6 rebounds per game, was named the A-10 Rookie of the Year and was placed on the conference's All-Rookie team. Christian Sengfelder, averaging 11.4 points and 7.3 rebounds per game, was also named to the All-Rookie team. And Jon Severe, who has had a rocky season, was selected to the All-Academic team with a 3.21 grade-point average.

In 2014-15, Paschall and Sengfelder combined to win the conference's Rookie of the Week award seven times. They were Fordham's two best players on the court. Severe was in and out of the lineup this year and averaged just 6.6 points per game. The Rams can only hope that being recognized for what he did in the classroom will help his confidence going forward.

The awards were nice. Fordham's focus, however, is on the A-10 tournament, which begins tonight with an opening-round matchup against George Mason at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

It will be the second meeting of the season between the two schools. Back on Feb. 18, Fordham (9-20, 4-14) picked up its only A-10 road win of the year, an 80-68 victory over the Patriots (9-21, 4-14). Fordham beat George Mason twice last year and is 4-0 all-time against the Patriots.

Head coach Tom Pecora says the only thing that matters is how his team plays Wednesday night.

"All that stuff goes out the window," he said about the Rams' previous success against George Mason. "It doesn't have anything to do with past performance.

"It's not a horrible matchup for us. The key is how well [the Patriots] shoot the ball. We have to respect that. They play really hard for [head coach] Paul [Hewitt]. There's no quit in them."

He added: "It's the A-10 tournament. It's going to be hand-to-hand combat. It's going to come down to one or two possessions."

The biggest question mark for the Rams as they make the short trip from the Bronx down to Brooklyn revolves around Paschall's status. The conference's sixth-leading scorer sustained a high ankle sprain in practice last Tuesday and missed the last three games of the regular season as a result.

At practice yesterday, Paschall mostly rode a stationary bike and took a few shots off on a side basket. Pecora knows how important he is to the team and expects him to play, though not at 100 percent.

"The key will be Eric," he said. "Where's Eric's health at as we go into this game? I met with him and said to him, 'You're not going to be 100 percent, but at 80 percent, you're still pretty darn good.'"

Fordham will need Paschall tonight. After winning four of six, the Rams lost all three games that he missed.

"Eric being hurt the last couple of games kind of took the wind out of our sails a little bit as far as momentum, but other than that, they're still engaged, they're still enthusiastic, they're still locked in," Pecora said. "There are a lot of teams that could have the same record as us that are just dying for the year to be over. I don't believe that's the case with this group."

Tuesday's practice was the 88th of the season. Pecora said the team has had three "duds."

"For a young team, that's impressive," he said. "Young teams come out some days and they just want to go through the motions. I threw them out of practice once all season. The other two days I just got on them."

"Playing hard and competing is a big-time skill," Pecora added. "It's hard to find in a lot of kids. There's been a lot of positives."

This will be Fordham's second game at Barclays this season. On Dec. 22, the Rams lost to Manhattan, the eventual MAAC champion, 71-57 at the Brooklyn arena. Pecora said the experience playing there in the past will help his team this time around.

"Anytime you can get a young team on the floor and they get exposed to something for the first time...it's really just about exposing them," he said. "As tough as it was to lose to Manhattan, it got us in the building. That was as big a part of this for me as anything else. We've been in that building. We've played in that building. Hopefully there's a little bit more familiarity for us. Hopefully, we have a bigger crowd than our opponents moving forward in that building. That's key."

In 2013-14, Fordham lost its last eight regular-season games but still managed to beat George Mason in the first round of the tournament. This year, Pecora says the Rams are in a better position heading in.

"Because they've learned how to win," he said. "I think their confidence, because of those A-10 wins, is there." 

Tonight will be an important game for Fordham, though it's hoping to extend its stay a few more days. After an up-and-down regular season that saw the Rams lose their first nine conference games before rebounding in February, getting a win or two this week would do wonders for the growth and development of a young team with a solid nucleus and more help on the way.

"Anytime you can get a win in your conference tournament...nobody wants to be the first team out. No one wants to go home day one," Pecora told Bleacher Report after Tuesday's practice. "If it were back-to-back years and we had A-10 wins, obviously it would be great for the kids.

"That's how I look at this as we move forward. It really is about them gaining confidence and the way they look at themselves and the way they view themselves and this basketball program. If they feel good about themselves and they're competing at a high level, I think everything takes care of itself."

A win Wednesday night would be nice. Some might say it's crucial. Regardless, Pecora is excited about his team's future.

"These young guys inspire me," he told B/R. "They come in every day, and they want to get better, and they want to work hard. Their work ethic is such that they've never laid down. I think that speaks volumes for where we are as a program."

Quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

Fordham hasn't won many basketball games this year. But the one thing head coach Tom Pecora has been able to count on has been his team's effort.

In the Rams' 81-66 loss to Duquesne Wednesday night at the Rose Hill Gym, even that was missing.

"I think they just came in and they wanted it more," Pecora said about the Dukes. "That's concerning to me considering how well we'd been playing."

After losing its first nine Atlantic 10 games, Fordham had won four of its last seven.

Wednesday night, it looked like the Rams were poised to notch their fifth conference win. They were ahead 32-20 with five minutes and 13 seconds to go in the first half. Then, it all fell apart. 

Duquesne outscored the Rams 18-3 to close out the half and pulled away after the break. The Dukes shot 49.1 percent from the floor including 45.5 percent from three-point range. Fordham shot 40.9 percent from the floor and just 19.4 percent (6-of-31) from beyond the arc.

The Rams played without their leading scorer, freshman Eric Paschall (16.5 points per game), who injured his ankle in practice on Tuesday.

"Not the way we planned it obviously." Pecora said. "Knowing Eric wasn't going to be able to play today we were going to have to find 17, 18 points from one of the guys who replaced him. That wasn't the case."

"It was a great test for us to see if we could rise to the occasion," he added. "It is what it is. Injuries are part of the game. We just have to find a way to respond and play better."

Even without Paschall, Fordham managed to go up by 12 points in the first half. But the Dukes made a run in the last five minutes before halftime and they controlled the game the rest of the way.

"They raised the intensity closing out the first half," Pecora said. "We didn't respond."

Fordham has lost before—it's 9-19 overall and 4-13 in the A-10—but for the most part the effort has always been there. According to Pecora, that was not the case the past two days.

"We didn't have a good practice yesterday," he said. "Yesterday was a dud. I had to ride them. I guess I was a prophet when I said to them, 'You might have lost this game today.' As much as we were pushing them and pushing them, they were fighting us in practice...to just play all out and do the things we needed them to do."

This was a winnable game for Fordham. It started the night one game behind Duquesne in the conference standings. But in the second half the two teams looked leagues apart.

"It bothers me greatly," Pecora said. "We had an opportunity to jump them in the standings. There was a lot at stake and we didn't play with that sense of urgency...I'll address that."

Against the Dukes, four Rams starters—Bryan Smith (17 points), Ryan Rhoomes (15 points), Christian Sengfelder (15 points) and Mandell Thomas (12 points)—scored in double digits. But the Rams only received seven points from everyone else. 

"These guys have to come in and compete," Pecora said. "Guys who are on the bench always say 'I should be playing more.' Well tonight they got a chance and they didn't respond."

How Fordham responds at practice and in its game at St. Bonaventure will be worth noting just days ahead of next week's A-10 tournament at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

"I think we're in much better shape than we were last year going in with so many losses late in the year," Pecora said about the state of his team going into the tournament. "We'll see how they respond. Maybe this is a wake-up call. Maybe some of these guys will realize how important game prep is, and effort.

"The one thing I've always told all my teams is if I'm coaching effort, especially late in the season, then we're not going to be very good. That should be a given especially this time of year. Effort should be a given."

Quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

Fordham's final three regular-season games and however many more it ends up playing in the Atlantic 10 tournament are, for multiple reasons, critical to the development and psyche of the program.

First and foremost, the goal is always to win basketball games. Having won four of their last six, the Rams actually have something going right now.

But a big part of the final two weeks of the season will be about Bryan Smith, the only senior on the roster who plays significant minutes. 

Last year, Branden Frazier went through his own farewell tour that included two games at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. He closed out his college career in the borough where he grew up.

Frazier had a memorable four-year stint at Fordham. He followed Tom Pecora to Rose Hill in 2010 when Pecora was named head coach of the Rams. He ended up finishing second in school history in assists (495) and ninth in points (1,642). In his senior season, he led the team in scoring and assists.

At the start of last season's A-10 tournament, there was an article on Frazier in The Wall Street Journal. People got to know his story—what he was all about and what he accomplished on the basketball court. On a team that lacked star power, he was the go-to guy.

Pecora talked a lot about Frazier throughout the course of last season, his comments picking up in intensity and emotion as Frazier got closer and closer to the end.

Smith, also from Brooklyn, didn't have the career Frazier had, but that doesn't mean he'll just ride off into the sunset without any accolades thrown his way. Next Wednesday, he'll play his final home game when Fordham hosts Duquesne at the Rose Hill Gym.

"I'm hoping we can sell this place out for him because he deserves it," Pecora said. "Bryan had an opportunity to go a lot of places, a lot of other really good schools. He chose to come here when it wasn't the popular thing to do; it was a hard thing to do.

"His dad's an alum. I just said to him, 'Your mom and dad have to be so happy and proud of you.'

"Next Wednesday, I want to have a great crowd here. It's going to be an emotional night for him."

2014-15 was supposed to be about Smith and Ryan Canty serving as the leaders on a team trying to begin a new era of Fordham basketball. Canty ended up missing the entire season after having back surgery last summer, and the young Rams struggled at the start of conference play, losing their first nine games. They've recovered this month, and Smith has played a big part in the turnaround.

"The way they're playing now, the way they're maturing, a lot of that has to do with Bryan and the job he's done as the lone senior," Pecora said. "Bryan's done a great job."

Though his senior season hasn't been your typical fairytale, the 6'2" guard may be saving his best for last.

In the Rams' win over La Salle Wednesday night, Smith had 15 points to go along with four rebounds and four assists. It was the fourth straight game where he's scored in double digits.

Heading into Saturday's game at UMass, Smith is averaging 5.7 points per game. More importantly, though, he's provided leadership on a team that includes seven freshmen, one sophomore and two juniors.

The Rams will be able to replace Smith's scoring next season. What they'll need is for Canty, Ryan Rhoomes and Mandell Thomas to provide the leadership.

For now, Smith is focused on one thing, though he can't help but think about his Fordham career coming to an end.

"I want to win, that's the most important thing to me," Smith said. "Of course it's in the back of my mind, but I want to get the win first."

Quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

Fordham didn't just beat La Salle Wednesday night. It did so in convincing fashion.

The Rams never trailed in their 63-48 win over the Explorers in front of 1,586 at the Rose Hill Gym. It was Fordham's fourth win in its last six games, and its third in a row at home. The Rams are now 9-17 overall and 4-11 in the Atlantic 10.

With three games remaining before the conference tournament, they're playing their best basketball of the season.

"I think we send a message when people see these scores and they see us winning not only at home but by double digits," Fordham head coach Tom Pecora said in his postgame remarks to the media. "We're obviously making great progress. Now we have to go find a way to go get one at UMass and really shake things up a little bit here."

It took Fordham a long time to get to where it is today. Forget about its first 19 years in the A-10—to understand the Rams' struggles, all one has to do is consider this season alone.

Fordham was 5-6 heading into conference play in early January. It lost its first nine A-10 games, but has since bounced back.

"It's never too late," Pecora said about winning basketball games. "I'm looking at this like we have seven, maybe eight games left if we get on a run in [the Atlantic 10] tournament.

"I don't think anyone in the league is looking forward to playing anyone [else] in the league. I just think it's going to be a really interesting Atlantic 10 tournament, especially if we can get a little momentum going in the beginning of it.

"Our goal is to jump into that eight, nine, 10 spot. The way we do that is by continuing to win [in] our last three regular season games."

Pecora is now 43-102 since taking over the program in 2010. Despite the record, the Rams have had their moments, especially at home. The win against St. John's in 2010 and back-to-back wins against Georgia Tech and Harvard in the 2011-12 season come to mind.

But the last three wins at the Rose Hill Gym against Saint Louis, Saint Joseph's and La Salle were different. After all, they were conference wins.

"Those [weren't] A-10 games," Pecora said about the wins early on in his tenure. "Those [were] great wins back then, wins we're very proud of. [But] when you can do it in this conference—in the seventh-ranked conference in the country—against these kind of opponents, it's very important and I think it's impressive.

"They haven't quit a bit. We've had two, maybe three dud practices all year. Today was practice No. 81. That goes to them, it goes to their competitive nature, it goes to their spirit, it goes to the grit and toughness they have and their willingness to believe in themselves and in each other. That's what this is all about."

Of course, nothing beats winning.

"Winning is fun," Pecora said. "It's fun for me. It's fun to walk into that locker room and see smiles on their faces, to see how excited they are. That's what lights me up. My assistants deserve this, too."

Fordham survived January. It made it to February when the schedule softened and the players gained experience. Now we're seeing the results.

"When we looked at the league schedule we thought it might be tough coming out of the gate," Pecora said. "There were a couple [games] we could have had early and we didn't get them just due to experience. I don't think that's going to be an issue as we move forward. I'm going to take these wins and we're going to keep rolling."

He added: "You can't control certain things. [The] conference schedule is one of them. You just play it out the way it is.

"They have confidence now; you can see that. I don't think whether we're home or on the road we're going to be intimidated by anyone. We're going to go after people in whatever environment we go into."

In an interview with Bleacher Report after the game Wednesday night, Pecora said it all comes down to effort. If the effort is there, the wins will follow.

"If we just continue to compete every day in practice like we have and the young guys continue to develop and we get good leadership from the vets, we'll compete every night," Pecora said. "If we end up on the right side of the ledger that would be great. Obviously we want to win every game we play. If the effort's where it's been and the execution's where it's been there's some more wins out there for us.

Pecora is thinking big. He's optimistic his team can pick up some wins the rest of the way, including in two weeks when the conference tournament takes place at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.

"Why not?" he asked. "Why can't we be the team that makes a run? It's happened before."

If it's going to happen again, Fordham will need to shoot like it did Wednesday night (45.9 percent from the field), it will have to outrebound its opponents like it did against the Explorers (46-34) and it will need to continue to bring it on the defensive end (La Salle shot 29.5 percent from the floor).

If you've ever questioned Pecora's resolve, or thought he might not be able to get it done at Rose Hill, you might want to reconsider. Four wins in six games. Three one-possession losses in conference play.

The Rams spent a long time stuck in traffic. Now they're beginning to make their turn. Pecora is proving the doubters wrong.

"I never lost faith in these guys," he told B/R. "I believed we'd get better as the year went on because of our youth and because of some of the adjustments, some of the injuries and some of the issues we've dealt with.

"I feel good about this. You have to live in the moment. Now it's about UMass."

Pecora said the two-point loss to Richmond and the two losses to Rhode Island, both one-possession games, "still stick in our crawl." But he's thrilled with the way his team has responded.

"I have no doubt that this young group learned from those," he said. "They learned how to close games and finish games and they've proven that. They bounced back."

Finally, the Rams have been able to enjoy some success.

"I'm excited about that for the kids," Pecora said. "This is my job. I've been through the wars. They're young guys. For them to keep their self-confidence up, for them to believe in themselves...They can walk around campus knowing they're playing at the level they thought they were capable of and then continuing to get better."

Quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

In an ESPN poll released last week, a majority of Division I men's college basketball coaches said they were in favor of shortening the shot clock.

According to Jeff Goodman's report on ESPN.com, of the 460 coaches polled, 59 percent favor changing the shot clock from 35 seconds to 30 seconds, 30 percent want it to remain at 35 seconds and 10 percent said it should go to 24 seconds.

Fordham head coach Tom Pecora has mentioned in the past how the NCAA could one day switch to a 30-second shot clock. On Sunday, moments after the Rams beat Saint Joseph's at the Rose Hill Gym, he talked with Bleacher Report about what the impact would be.

"It will affect certain programs more than others," Pecora said. "Teams that run offense where you're down and then try to score late in the clock—that's their philosophy. Now you're going to have about 22 seconds to score.

"I think you're going to see a lot more of people running hard entries into scoring. Shot selection is going to be an issue for some guys. The problem is they're not pros, they're college kids, so they don't make those difficult shots."

Jay Wright, the head coach at Villanova who is a close friend of Pecora's, told ESPN that he was in favor of taking it one step further.

"I think we should all have a 24-second shot," Wright said in the article. "Consistent. It's NBA and international. We should all learn to play the game the same way. The game is still the game. Everything you do to the game, everyone's adjusted."

While Pecora supports change, he said college basketball might not be ready for a 24-second shot clock just yet. He said moving it to 30 seconds would be a big enough change for now. 

"People who are involved with USA Basketball want to go to 24 because it will help us when we go out and we perform internationally," Pecora said. "They're trying to make it the same across the board. We could be there eventually, but I think this is good progress. If we just jump to 24 there might be mayhem."

Having said that, if the shot clock does indeed get shortened to 30 seconds, going to 24 seconds might be the next step.

"I think it might evolve into that in time," Pecora said.

"When you go to 24, you're not going to see upsets like you used to. The other thing, too, it's going to be much more difficult to hold the lead. You can't put the ball and the game on ice with a 24-second clock. It's going to change the game."

The lack of offense in college basketball is frequently cited as the primary reason for shortening the shot clock. Pecora, however, sees things differently. 

"I think lack of scoring is dictated by the defense and the way you're allowed to defend," he said. "It's just so physical defensively now. It's not the game that was played 20, 30 years ago where it was a beautiful, seamless, flowing offensive game. Now it's a bump and grind. You have to do it. Everybody does it. Everybody coaches it that way. It's become physical.

"The other thing is the court size hasn't changed and the bodies have, especially on the highest level. Try to put four guys in that lane. They can't be next to each other without banging into each other."

Asked what effects a shorter shot clock would have on his current team (Fordham is 8-16 overall and 3-10 in the Atlantic 10), Pecora said it comes down to experience.

"I think it would hurt a young team, it would help a veteran team," he said. "We're young. Like anything, especially if it became an immediate change, it would be good to have a veteran team that's accustomed to playing a little bit quicker."

Any change would need approval from both the Men's Basketball Rules Committee and the Playing Rules Oversight Panel, ESPN reported in the article.

Also of note, the NCAA announced earlier this month that it will experiment with a 30-second shot clock at this year's National Invitation Tournament.

"It will probably change a lot of things people do over summer workouts and what you do in the fall," Pecora said about any potential change. "I think it will be interesting to see how it plays out in year one."

Unless otherwise noted, quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello

Fordham lost a heartbreaker last Wednesday at Richmond. Ahead by eight points with six minutes, 11 seconds to go, the Rams squandered the lead and lost the game, 73-71.

On Sunday, in front of 2,885 on Alumni Day at the Rose Hill Gym, Fordham was determined not to let another second-half lead slip away.

The Rams led for the final 17:15 and beat Saint Joseph's, 69-55, to improve to 7-16 overall and 2-11 in the Atlantic 10.

"Obviously, I'm very pleased with the effort," Fordham head coach Tom Pecora said moments after his team evened its home record at 7-7. "It looks like we learned something about closing out games, which we talked about after Wednesday night's loss at Richmond—a game we could have won had we closed it out."

The fact that the Rams won is one thing—a story unto itself when you consider their difficulties this season. That they did it on the backs of their three upperclassmen makes the victory even more significant.

Senior Bryan Smith scored 12 points and added four assists. Junior Mandell Thomas scored 20 points to go along with six assists. And Ryan Rhoomes, also a junior, had six points and 12 rebounds.

For Rhoomes, it was the 13th time this year that he's had nine or more rebounds in a game.

Meanwhile, Thomas took over as the team's starting point guard on Jan. 22, a Pecora move that seems to be paying off. Thomas is averaging 12.6 points, 4.3 rebounds and 3.4 assists per game, and he's helped settle down a turnover-prone offense.

Smith may be the biggest story to emerge from Sunday's game. The senior has had a rocky season, struggling with his shot for a good portion of the current campaign.

But Sunday, he was 4-of-6 from the field, and he knocked down a huge three-pointer with under seven minutes left in the game when Richmond had cut the Rams lead to six.

"Our lone senior did a wonderful job," Pecora said about Smith, "not only being a leader but making big-time plays, making big-time shots in a timely fashion.

"Bryan's had an up-and-down season, but I believe he's going to finish strong. He deserves it."

Pecora praised Smith's leadership "even on nights when he's not making shots." He talked about Thomas "embracing the move to the point position." And he mentioned the "workmanlike performance" turned in by Rhoomes.

The loyalty Pecora has shown to his three upperclassmen, through good times and bad, paid off Sunday afternoon.

"You can only be as good as your upperclassmen," Pecora said. "I've had teams where I had seniors who didn't play, but because they accepted that role in a positive fashion and they were great in practice and they were great in the locker room, we were able to have a great year.

"There's a lot of teams out there where there's a couple juniors and a senior that are upset they're not playing and they're ruining it for the season. These guys aren't letting that happen.

"The young guys really respect them. The development of the young guys has a lot to do with the way these guys treat them. When they were freshmen, there wasn't that veteran leader who was going to help them and take them under their wing, and that made their challenge even greater."

For once, it wasn't all about the freshmen, a group that includes Eric Paschall (10 points and eight rebounds against the Hawks) and Christian Sengfelder (15 points and nine rebounds), the team's top two rookies.

In so many ways, the season has been about Fordham's youth movement. But Sunday, we were reminded not to forget about the guys who have been through this before, who this time around would like nothing more than to win some basketball games.

"We're maturing, and we're getting better," Pecora said. "That's what this is all about.

"In the beginning of the year, we always say, 'Let's get 1 percent better every day in practice—don't get worse, always get a little bit better.'

"We're on our 76th practice. That's holding true. We continue to get better. We're making some strides in February, and that's when you want to be good."

Pecora is right: The Rams are getting better. Consider that three of their last four losses have been by a combined nine points. They now have an 18-point win over Saint Louis and Sunday's 14-point victory over Saint Joseph's on their record.

It appears Fordham may finally be headed in the right direction.

"This league is wide open," Pecora said. "We just have to keep our mojo going through the month of February, and we could be a dangerous team."

Quotations in this article were obtained firsthand.

Charles Costello covers the Fordham Rams for Bleacher Report. A full archive of his articles can be found here. Follow him on Twitter: @CFCostello