Robert Morris guards Jimmy Langhurst and Karon Abraham struggled to pinpoint why the Colonials had just finished their worst shooting game of the season.

"We had wide-open shots, it's just the ball wasn't rolling to us tonight," Langhurst said. "I don't know. The basketball god was against us."

Added Abraham: "Sure was."

A late rally could not save Robert Morris from the basketball deities or a 26.1-percent shooting performance as the Colonials fell to Appalachian State, 65-52, last night at the Sewall Center.

It was Robert Morris' first home loss since Dec. 28, 2008, breaking a 13-game home winning streak. And it came in the same week as the Colonials' best shooting game of the season -- a 78-70 victory against Cleveland State Tuesday in which Robert Morris made 53.7 percent of its shots. The Colonials' previous season low was a 34.3 percent in a 71-66 loss at Albany in November.

Robert Morris coach Mike Rice called the game last night "the worst shooting performance I have ever seen."

The Colonials attempted 22 more shots than the Mountaineers but made three fewer field goals.

"It's mind-boggling," Rice said.

What frustrated Rice most was that there was only a handful of shots that he thought were bad looks, meaning most of the Colonials' struggles could be attributed to poor shooting rather than good defense.

"We have problems," he said.

Despite its woes, Robert Morris (4-6) pulled within one point with less than six minutes remaining after trailing by 13 earlier in the second half. But the Mountaineers (7-4) pulled away late to earn their third all-time win against Robert Morris.

The Colonials struggled offensively as Appalachian State switched between man-to-man and zone defenses.

"We just tried to mix it up as much as possible," Appalachian State coach Buzz Peterson said.

The Colonials trailed, 33-24, at the intermission, shooting 28.6 percent in the half.

Robert Morris left the locker room early before the start of the second half -- more than four minutes before Appalachian State did -- to warm up and work on its shooting in an attempt to fix its first-half woes.

It didn't do much good.

Robert Morris missed its first four shots of the second half and shot 13.3 percent in the first eight minutes of the second half.

But the Mountaineers struggled from the field early in the second half, too, and could not build a sizeable lead.

That allowed the Colonials to crawl back into the game when they finally got some shots to fall.

Langhurst made two 3-pointers in less than a minute to pull the Colonials within six with 6:35 remaining.

"I started getting in a groove," Langhurst said. "It felt good, and I think we kind of got a boost off of that on the bench."

That deficit shrank to four a minute later when Dallas Green made a jump shot with 5:40 to go.

Abraham made three free throws 25 seconds later to cut the deficit to 50-49. Langhurst missed an open 3-point attempt that would have given the Colonials the lead and momentum that the players thought would have translated to a victory.

The Mountaineers added 12 more points before the Colonials scored again, but at that point, 59 seconds remained and the game was out of reach.

"They didn't do anything to stop us," Abraham said. "We stopped ourselves. We beat ourselves."

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