Detroit Mercy 71, UWM 58: After an uplifting victory two days earlier the Panthers' offense disappears in the second half

Momentum?

What momentum?

The UW-Milwaukee Panthers had to be asking themselves that Saturday afternoon, when they followed up what may have been the most impressive victory of coach Pat Baldwin's tenure two days earlier with one of their worst 20 minutes of basketball.

Sure, Detroit Mercy's Antoine Davis finished with a game-high 30 points. That's almost to be expected every time out for the senior guard.

But it was the Panthers' complete inability to execute offensively in the second half that doomed them in a 71-58 loss to the Titans at UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena.

UWM (7-13, 5-6 Horizon League) missed 17 consecutive shots and made just 5 of 29 shots (17.2%) after halftime, allowing Detroit (6-10, 4-3) to roar past the Panthers late with Davis leading the way.

"It's disappointing," said Baldwin, whose team dumped previous conference unbeaten Oakland, 88-78, its previous time out with superlative efforts both offensively and defensively, an effort that spurred some definite optimism.

"You want every single win, obviously. But when you start thinking about the way that we played – we had 20 assists in that game and we did a great job on their best scorer – you want to follow that up.

"It's a different dynamic and type of player (in Davis). We wanted to finish better, and we were right there. Other than probably 4-5 minutes of this game, you could probably say we played the way that we wanted to.

"We just didn't finish the way that we needed to in order to get this win."

A putback by Vin Baker Jr. and three by DeAndre Gholston out of the locker room to start the second half gave the Panthers a 39-33 advantage.

The Titans responded by scoring 11 of the next 12 to regain the lead. Then came a brutal stretch in which the game bogged down significantly, as both teams went stone cold from the field.

The Panthers were particularly inept, to the point they missed 17 shots in a row after Gholston's three until Josh Thomas scored on a drive with 7 minutes 29 seconds remaining, a stretch of 11:07 without a basket.

"There were some opportunities that we had in the first half, some drive-and-kicks that we took advantage of, then I thought we kind of settled for some shots in the second half," Baldwin said. "The ball didn't move, didn't have the pop that we needed in order to make the defense shift from side to side."

Even still, the shot by Thomas gave UWM a 48-46 lead, a remarkable feat helped greatly by the continued bottling up of Davis.

He mostly settled for setting up his teammates until he finally decided to take the game over with just under 5 minutes left.

A couple of drives to the basket, a jumper from the lane after a beautiful reverse pivot and, of course, a pair of threes gave him 12 points in a span of just over 3 minutes and turned a competitive game into a rout down the stretch.

Gholston's leaner made it 52-49 with 5:40 left.

By the time Davis had knocked down that second three with 1:34 remaining – letting loose a celebratory scream as he ran back downcourt – the score was 65-54 in favor of the Titans.

"Somebody has to finish the game," said Davis, who has averaged 31 points per game against UWM over his career. "We've really struggled when we're in close games, finishing out the last 3-4 minutes.

"I just felt like I needed to take over for us to win the game."

In the teams' first meeting on Jan. 7 – an 85-60 blowout victory for the Titans – Davis single-handedly outscored the Panthers, 23-20, in the first half.

UWM did a much better job controlling the 6-foot-1 dynamo in the opening 20 minutes in this one, with Gholston and Jordan Lathon sharing responsibility for shadowing him all over the court.

Davis got off to a good start by hitting his first two shots, but found the going much tougher as the half progressed and ultimately finished with nine points on 4-for-11 shooting while playing all 20 minutes.

"They played really good defense," Davis said. "But at the same time I feel like I was just missing some shots at the beginning that I normally would hit. I started off 2 for 2 and kind of went cold for a little bit.

"I got the looks that I really wanted for the most part, but they just didn't fall for me."

On the other end, the Panthers faced a staunch zone defense for the second straight game and again did an admirable job against it by finding the gaps, working the baseline and not forcing three-pointers.

After Davis hit his lone three to give the Titans a 31-25 lead with 5:12 remaining, UWM closed the first half on a 9-2 run with all three baskets coming from beyond the arc and the final two courtesy of Devon Hancock.

Hancock hit 3 threes in all to lead the Panthers with nine points in just six minutes and UWM shot an even 50% with seven players chalking up 10 assists on 14 baskets -- a far cry from what would develop in the second half.

The Panthers finished their four-game home stand at 2-2 and head out on a four-game road swing that could include the return of Patrick Baldwin Jr. (ankle) on the back end.

"He's day to day," Baldwin said of his son, who's missed six straight games, nine of 10 and 12 of 20 this season due to injury and COVID-19. "He's gotten some positive news as far as getting back on the floor and working out.

"Don't want to put too much pressure on him. But as far as getting out there and running and cutting and moving around, he's starting to do that."

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Detroit Mercy 71, UWM 58: Panthers' offense disappears in second half