Providence 79 – Rutgers 69

Just over a week ago, cruising along with a 12-4 record and a pair of encouraging Big East wins, many wondered how good Rutgers was. But after losing three straight, including getting humbled on its home court by struggling Providence last night, the question is, how bad are the Scarlet Knights?

They were outworked, outhustled and outplayed in a 79-69 loss, their third straight at home. After falling behind by 21 in the first half, they were booed off their court at intermission by the 6,131 in attendance at Rutgers Athletic Center.

“We couldn’t buy one basket,” coach Gary Waters said after seeing Rutgers (12-7, 2-4 Big East) shoot 34.4 percent and allowing Providence to shoot 60 percent from the field. “This hurts. This is a setback. We’ve got to regroup and get ourselves back together. They whipped our butts. They took it from us.”

With upcoming games vs. Louisville and at Syracuse, Rutgers easily could go from 12-4 to 12-9 and turn this into five-game fall. With six of their last nine games on the road, where Waters is 3-31 in-league, the Knights had better get back to their stout defense and find a complement for Quincy Douby to save their season.

“We knew when Quincy isn’t on, doing his thing, we’re going to struggle,” Waters said.

The junior guard, whose 23.3 ppg average coming in was ninth in the country, scored 18 last night but shot 5-for-20, 1-for-7 in the first half. Providence pushed its matchup zone out farther to harass him, and shaded it toward him instead of the ball.

It worked, as did everything the Friars (9-8, 2-4) did on offense. Donnie McGrath, who missed four straight foul shots two years ago when Rutgers rallied from five down with 15 seconds to play, redeemed himself with a game-high 23 points last night. He had 17 in the first half, going 5-for-5 from 3-point range.

“Defensively they stopped us, offensively they scored at will,” Douby said. “We didn’t do [anything] good.”

Rutgers trailed 28-22 after Jaron Griffin’s three-point play with 6:37 left in the half. Providence blew it open with a 6-minute, 16-1 spurt. Rutgers went 0-for-5 with five turnovers in that drought, and Herbert Hill’s dunk made it 44-23.

“That’s as good as we played,” said Providence coach Tim Welsh, whose team was 1-5 on the road, started three freshmen, and hadn’t won at the RAC since 2001. “We haven’t had an 18-point lead on anybody – not non-conference, mid-major, low-major, guarantee game, exhibition, no one.”