Darien Brothers Goes Off As Richmond Hands Charlotte Their First Conference Loss

Much of the nation and Atlantic 10 Conference fans in particular having been wondering just how for real the Charlotte 49ers will be.

Well, they ran into a brick wall on Saturday thanks to a career performance from Richmond guard Darien Brothers.

Brothers went off, converting on 10-of-14 shot attempts and finishing the contest with 39 points in all. Brothers paced the way throughout the contest as Richmond took a ten point lead into the halftime intermission. The Spiders won the final 20 minutes by another ten points, en-route to winning the contest by a final score of 81-61.

So, it’s just one game, but certainly a cause for concern in Charlotte’s pursuit of conference contention. The A-10 is quickly becoming one the more premier, non-power six leagues in college basketball and the 49ers’ success thus far this season was just another testament to that.

Charlotte is looking at an interesting stretch and the answer to the question of just how much of a threat they will be should answer itself over the coming weeks.

The story of the night however, was Brothers’ performance. He scored the game’s first nine points, building an advantage for the Spiders right out of the gate. Brothers never looked back after that, controlling the tempo and the Richmond lead by himself.

Brothers had also grabbed eight rebounds in the victory while nailing 8-of-11 shots from beyond the arc. While this marks his best collegiate performance to date, Brothers is not new to scoring the ball, having reached the 20-point plateau on five different occasions this year.

 

Follow Paul Seaver on Twitter: @PaulSeaverRS