John Thompson III had no mercy on his little brother, Ball State University's first year coach Ronny Thompson.
The Cardinals went down early in the contest and never recovered, falling to No. 14 Georgetown University 69-54.
Ball State was behind by 12 points at the half. In the second half, the Cardinals were unable to close the lead to within 10, and were down by as much as 23 points, as the elder brother's team won by 15.
"After the game my brother came into our locker room, and told the guys to keep working hard," Ronny Thompson said. "He said that watching us on film, he has no idea how hard we played. It was good for them to hear that from him and I know they appreciated it."
With the loss, the Cardinals drop to a 2-4 record, the worst start for the program since the 1986-87 season when Al Brown's team went 9-18 in his final season as head coach. Still, the younger Thompson was impressed with his team's effort.
"We practice hard, and that's what we are all about," he said. "Whether we are up 20 or down 20, we have to play hard every minute we are on the court. We just went through a tough stretch, but we still played hard and the guys gave great effort. I am proud of our guys."
No Cardinal scored more than 10 points in the loss. Junior Micah Rollin and sophomore Anthony Newell had 10 points.
Ball State was also outsized, with the four leading scorers for the Hoyas all standing 6-foot-8 or taller. Rollin, at 6-foot-10, was the only Cardinal above 6-foot-7 who saw any playing time.
"My brother has layers and layers of guys who are 6-foot-8 or taller," Ronny Thompson said. "Defensively, we tried to mix it up with some zone and some man-to-man. They just have talent at every position."
Skip Mills had his first start of the season for the Cardinals, but failed to make much of a dent on the offensive end. He shot 3-of-12 from the field and ended the game with nine points.
"This part of the season is to see what your strengths and weaknesses are," Mills said. "We are learning a lot about our team right now and we all feel that we are close."
Rollin hit 5-of-9, and Peyton Stovall shot 4-of-6 from the field. Also, the Cardinals shot 5-11 from the 3-point line, far better than their season average of 19.4 percent. It was the Cardinals' best performance from beyond the arch.
The contest was the first meeting of the two programs, and the second time John Thompson III defeated the Ball State. The first time was in 2000 and was his second game as a head coach of the Princeton Tigers.
John Thompson, the former Georgetown head coach and father of John Thompson III and Ronny Thompson, was in attendance, but refused to pick sides in the contest and was opposed to the game in the first place.
"I'm rooting for Thompson," he said, wearing a grey baseball cap with a T on it. "I like my chances. But a Thompson has to lose, and that's the frustrating feeling of a game like this."
The Cardinals will look to end its losing skid when they return to Worthen Arena on Saturday to play Indiana State University.
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