The players had no words. Head coach Bashir Mason struggled to say anything in the postgame press conference. From dreams to misery, win or go home. This time, the outcome was “go home.”
ATLANTIC CITY, covering the 2026 MAAC Men’s Basketball Championship — The disappointment was palpable.
The Peacocks entered the MAAC tournament last weekend with the intention of becoming conference champions and advancing to the NCAA tournament. They were the No. 2 seed. They believed in the strength of numbers, where everyone would contribute and win games. That approach served them well until Friday, March 6, when they lost to the No. 7 Fairfield Stags 74-55 at Jim Whelan Boardwalk Hall.
Maybe it would have been a different story if the Peacocks had played Marist or Mount Saint Mary’s. Remember, the Stags entered the tournament as the trending team to win it all after winning eight of 11, so the Peacocks had a tough matchup, despite sweeping their MAAC playoff opponent this season.
Brandon Benjamin had a double-double against the Peacocks, 26 points/15 rebounds (photo, Fairfield University)
The Stags showed why everyone was high on them. Fairfield’s freshman trio of Newark’s Brandon Benjamin, Teaneck’s Declan Wucherpfennig, and Tony Williams was too much for the Peacocks. They shot well in this game. They combined to score 55 points.
After the Stags started the game by missing eight shots and two free throws, Benjamin scored the team’s first 14 of 16 points, tying the game at 16. He finished the game on 10-of-16 shooting. “Once I hit the first free throw, I knew everything would come together,” Benjamin said about his output.
It was an inkling of things to come.
Even when the Peacocks tied the game at 30 after Zaakir Williamson grabbed the rebound on a Bryce Eaton’s missed free throw and tied it at the buzzer to end the first half, the Stags felt good about themselves.
The Stags went on a 10-0 run to start the second half with 3-pointers by Wucherpfennig and Williams, who scored 11 of his 16 points in that half. From there, the Peacocks never recovered despite cutting it down to 42-40. The Stags just had all the energy and momentum.
The Peacocks could have lived with Fairfield beating them. They could not have lived with awful games from their players all across the board.
The Peacocks struggled to get anything going offensively in the second half. Even Brent Bland struggled after finishing with a pedestrian 11 points, the only Peacock to register double-digits in scoring. Overall, they shot 36.4% in the game compared to the Stags’ 43.5%.
The Peacocks’ role players couldn’t do anything in this game, which was surprising since they performed well all season. TJ Robinson received a surprising start to throw a different look at Fairfield, but he scored eight points in 27 minutes. Lucas Scroggins (six points), Elijah Perkins (four), Jahki Gupton (four), and Williamson (six) never gave the Peacocks any spark as they have done this season, especially in the second half when the situation called for it. They combined to score only 20 points.
This is a team that fed off confidence and energy all year, which Mason loved about this team this season. Instead, all he could do was envy Fairfield by saying they were us, insinuating that their opponent played their style of game.
For Fairfield, their freshmen played like they didn’t know any better, as if the NCAA tournament were just an ordinary game. For the Peacocks’ bench, they played as if the moment might have been big for them.
Maybe the Peacocks don’t beat Siena in the next round of the conference tournament. We’ll never know, which makes it more disappointing. Now, the Peacocks will spend all summer working on their game and making sure a different result happens in the tournament.
Here’s what they can do: Follow baseball sage Buck Showalter’s advice by playing better.
