The Armor dropped their sixth game in seven tries against the Red Claws.
Armor forward Willie Reed is boxed in between Maine's Scott VanderMeer, left, and Chris Wright Thursday at the MassMutual Center.
SPRINGFIELD – When a team is struggling, it seems everything goes against it.
The Springfield Armor are that team right now, falling 108-94 to the Maine Red Claws despite a season-high 22 offensive rebounds Thursday night before 1,780 at the MassMutual Center.
It was the fifth loss in six games for Springfield (9-20), and the sixth time in seven games it has fallen to Maine (18-12).
“They’re a good team, and when you can bring two NBA guys off the bench you must be pretty good,” Armor coach Bob MacKinnon said. “We’ve got to execute better in the fourth quarter. We talked about that and I think we took too many jump shots, which leads to low percentages.”
The Armor, already the worst shooting team in the league with a field goal percentage of 42.1, shot just 38.4 percent from the floor despite a gaudy 99 attempts thanks to the offensive rebounds.
“You’ve got to get the ball inside and go to the rim, and I thought we ran some stuff to do that and were successful, but then we went away from it,” MacKinnon said. “We need to make better decisions.”
This was a game in which it seemed every loose ball went to the Red Claws, every break went against the Armor. The turnovers were similar, 15 for Springfield and 13 for Maine, but the visitors managed to make something out of most of the Armor turnovers.
Poor shooting, a recurring problem this season, hurt the Armor in the first half as they made just 39 percent of their shots from the field and trailed 53-49 at the break thanks to a 16-4 Maine run to end the second quarter.
Springfield, which led by as many as 10 points in the first quarter and by as many as eight points with a few minutes left in the half, made just 9 of 28 field goals in the second quarter.
There’s no faulting the effort of the Armor. They got after it on the offensive glass as MacKinnon used both Willie Reed (14 points) and Kenny Adeleke (10 points, 15 rebounds) on the floor at the same time to counter a Red Claws team that boasts three 7-footers.
“It was something I wanted to look at, especially with Dennis (Horner) being out,” MacKinnon said. “I thought that might give us some good inside play, and it did.”
Springfield had nine of its 13 offensive rebounds in the second quarter, but most of those boards resulted in missed shots.
The Armor took a 45-40 lead when Micah Downs dropped in a 3-pointer. Maine then stole the inbound pass and Shelvin Mack, just signed Thursday, hit a 3-pointer and the Red Claws had the lead just like that.
As Springfield’s shooting percentage dropped in the second half, the lead for the Red Claws grew. The Armor did tie it at 61-61 and got within one point at 71-70, but when Downs (17 points) caught an inbound pass with 0.6 seconds left and threw in a 3-pointer to end the third quarter it gave Maine 79-73 lead.
It was a three-point game when Chris Wright (game-high 27 points, 14 rebounds) threw down a one-handed slam that started a 10-2 run and put an end to Springfield’s chances of a comeback.
NOTES: Saturday’s game with the Bakersfield Jam at the MassMutual Center is on. Bakersfield plays Maine on Friday night and is already in Portland awaiting the return of the Red Claws ... Dennis Horner missed Thursday night’s game due to a head injury suffered in practice on Wednesday ... The Red Claws acquired guard Shelvin Mack before Thursday’s game and re-acquired forward Kris Joseph, this time from the D-League available player pool since Joseph is no longer the property of the Boston Celtics.
