vs Cal Poly 8-10 (4-5)
I still found it surprising we beat the Mustangs at their place - they're still more talented a squad than we are. I fully expect a revenge loss here.
It's 6 minutes before we score and we're down by 9 at the half when they score a buzzer-beater trey. It's playing out exactly how I expected. We get no closer than 3 and are blown out by 20.
vs UC-Irvine 5-15 (2-8)
We should annihilate the Anteaters. They're a bad team and one of their best players is out injured to boot.
A 4-point halftime lead ends in a 26 point rout.
Dennis Luther leads the murder with 23 points and 4 steals,
Butterfly Man scores 16 with 5 assists and a steal, and
Truman Crain puts up 14 points, 2 blocks.
@ CSU-Fullerton 16-6 (10-1)
The Titans' only Big West loss is still to the Aggies, so dial up another loss.
Yep. Every time we get within a single possession, they rip off a bunch of points and we lose by 10.
@ #25 UC-Davis 20-2 (12-0)
Yep, you read that right.
For the first time in this universe, the Big West has a Top 25 team. We won't be the spoilers here.
We're tied at 57-all with 2 minutes to go. And then we don't score the rest of the game. Par for the course.
vs Long Beach State 6-17 (4-8)
Can we get a win and finally start turning around what has been a terrible February? F in the chat says no.
We try our hardest to blow a 12 point second half lead, but make our FTs down the stretch to win by 10 in our most balanced victory all season.
Code:
Cal State Northridge 77, Long Beach State 67
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Long Beach State (6-18, 4-9):
Player Pos Min Fgm-a Ftm-a Off Reb Ast PF Pts
E. Hernandez C 21 3-5 2-2 3 8 1 5 8
Norris Ward PF 24 0-1 0-0 1 7 3 5 0
James Dias SF 18 7-12 2-3 0 1 2 5 17
Ciriaco Fuentes SG 29 0-5 0-0 0 1 2 5 0
Dario Ponce PG 30 6-9 0-2 0 3 4 3 13
Isiah Christy SG 15 3-8 2-3 0 1 0 1 8
Kenneth Kohl PF 19 5-9 1-2 0 1 0 1 12
Thomas Chalmers PG 5 0-1 0-0 0 0 0 1 0
Herberto Herrero SF 17 3-7 2-2 4 4 4 3 9
James Aguilar C 17 0-2 0-0 2 7 1 5 0
Quincy Allgood C 3 0-1 0-0 0 1 0 0 0
Felix Herrera SF 1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0
Turnovers: 19 (N.Ward 1, J.Dias 2, C.Fuentes 1, D.Ponce
5, I.Christy 2, K.Kohl 1, T.Chalmers 3, H.Herrero 2,
J.Aguilar 2)
Blocked Shots: 1 (N.Ward 1)
Steals: 5 (D.Ponce 3, J.Aguilar 2)
3P FGs: 4-15 (J.Dias 1-3, C.Fuentes 0-2, D.Ponce 1-1,
I.Christy 0-3, K.Kohl 1-1, T.Chalmers 0-1, H.Herrero
1-3, Q.Allgood 0-1)
Cal State Northridge (12-13, 8-6):
Player Pos Min Fgm-a Ftm-a Off Reb Ast PF Pts
Truman Crain C 34 4-7 4-6 0 1 3 4 12
Muhammad Owen PF 28 5-8 5-9 2 9 1 4 15
P. Faulvarque SF 26 1-6 4-6 0 5 0 2 6
Dennis Luther SG 35 2-3 10-13 1 6 3 2 14
Geoffrey Blodgett PG 32 4-5 2-3 0 3 1 2 12
Bogdan Gonchar SF 22 4-5 2-6 0 2 0 2 11
Kevin McKenzie SG 3 0-0 2-2 0 0 0 0 2
Jakub Sedlacek PG 1 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0
Austin Soukup C 14 2-3 1-1 0 2 0 1 5
Albert Ragsdale PF 3 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0
Brian Lowry C 1 0-0 0-0 0 1 0 0 0
Turnovers: 21 (T.Crain 3, M.Owen 1, P.Faulvarque 1,
D.Luther 5, G.Blodgett 4, B.Gonchar 5, A.Soukup 1,
A.Ragsdale 1)
Blocked Shots: 3 (T.Crain 2, A.Soukup 1)
Steals: 11 (T.Crain 2, M.Owen 1, D.Luther 3, G.Blodgett
2, B.Gonchar 3)
3P FGs: 3-10 (T.Crain 0-1, P.Faulvarque 0-4, D.Luther
0-1, G.Blodgett 2-3, B.Gonchar 1-1)
Player of Game: SG Dennis Luther (CSNTH)
vs UC-Santa Barbara 7-17 (5-8)
The Gauchos were only our other loss other than the Big Two in the first half of the conference season. Here's to hoping we get revenge but more realistically they sweep us.
Yep. 36.7% shooting as a team won't do it.
vs Pacific 2-24 (1-14)
We really, really need this win. It'd lock up .500 in Big West season play (still far short of the Big Dance ticket the AD wants) and would be a salve on how disappointing things have gone in the back half.
We're on the back foot almost the entire game but just barely manage to come back before almost blowing a 10 point lead. 4 win as
Truman Crain goes off for 20 points, 4 blocks, and 2 steals, but it's
Bogdan Gonchar's 17 points - including the last shot made all game, that secures the victory (Crain won PotG). An inefficient 13 points by
Butterfly Man
Recruiting finishes out.
Code:
#35 PG Paul Mattson
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Height: 6-3
Weight: 186
High School: Sutter High School
Hometown: Sutter, CA
GPA: 2.38
Test Score: 980
Rating: **
Attributes:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Type INS JPS FTS 3PS HND PAS ORB DRB PSD PRD STL BLK QKN STR JMP STA
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current: 24 27 44 33 28 39 6 17 21 30 77 25 74 21 76 4
Potential: C C C B D B F D D B A D
Season Stats:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PTS OREB REB AST TOS A/T STL BLK PFS
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
11.5 0.9 4.7 4.5 2.4 1.91 3.7 0.3 3.0
Shooting Averages:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FGM FGA FG% FTM FTA FT% 3PM 3PA 3P%
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.8 10.8 .447 1.5 2.5 .600 0.4 1.9 .211
Recruiting Notes:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Qualified: Yes
Committed to Cal State Northridge
Rankings: West Region #19 PG
High School Awards: None
Top 5 Schools: *Cal State Northridge, Cal Poly, Oregon State, Portland State, San
Jose State
Is this going to help our shooting woes? No. But if it's accurate, we reload our guard spots with another stellar stealer.
@ Hawaii 16-11 (10-6)
The Aggies got hit with the injury rashes we typically do and lost 3 straight games, so it's the Titans who have won the Big West title as I predicted in preseason that they'd do. We have a very outside shot of maybe sneaking up to 3rd, but to get there we'll need to win out - including topping the Rainbow Warriors in paradise.
We implode in the second half.
Whatever. Let's look at .500, collect our first round loss and move on.
Only
Truman Crain takes out his frustrations on UC-Riverside with a 17-7-3 blocks line and
Bogdan Gonchar adds 11 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 steals as we rock Riverside 62-47 to continue our recent trend of winning Big West season/trash season/winning Big West season/trash season/winning Big West season.
Big West Conference Tournament
@ Cal Poly
What an unkind draw. We're in the Titans' half of the bracket, so a loss is guaranteed even if we somehow advanced, but I really wanted the first round win to get to .500 overall on the season.
The game wasn't even close. A complete rout as we shoot 34% as a team and
Dennis Luther got hurt anyway.
CSU-Fullerton wins 93-88 over
UC-Davis in a great game that the conference deserved.
NCAA Tournament
CSU-Fullerton draws the Big West's highest-ever seeding at 9.
UC-Davis is snubbed by the committee but gets to defend their title in the NIT as a 2 seed.
CSU-Fullerton gets the first Big West Big Dance win, upsetting Florida 75-72. They're promptly annihilated by
Florida State in the second round, but so what?
The Aggies repeat as NIT champions, routing 8 seed Temple 73-48 in the final. Nobody ever really looked like challenging them much either. Big West: where NIT champions are born.
1 seed Florida State vs 10 seed Texas
1 seed Vanderbilt vs 2 seed Ohio State
The 1 seeds go chalk and the Seminoles savage the Commodores by a ton to take the title.
And Florida State won with a red player in the starting lineup. Just goes to show that the colors are only a rough overall guide and it's the whole team fit that matters.
Code:
2021 BIG WEST AWARDS
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Player of the Year:
SR SG Tyler Whitfield Cal State Fullerton 21.7 PPG, 5.1 RPG, 1.8 APG 0.8 SPG, 0.3 BPG
Freshman of the Year:
FR SG Joseph Friesen UC Santa Barbara 14.3 PPG, 6.3 RPG, 2.4 APG 0.9 SPG, 0.0 BPG
Coach of the Year:
Don Slagle Cal State Fullerton 27 - 7 (17 - 1)
All-league 1st Team:
C SR Asdrubal Moya Cal State Fullerton 11.1 PPG, 8.1 RPG, 1.8 APG, 0.7 SPG, 0.8 BPG
PF SR Devin West UC Davis 10.5 PPG, 6.0 RPG, 1.3 APG, 0.9 SPG, 0.2 BPG
SF JR Marco Bass UC Davis 10.5 PPG, 4.0 RPG, 2.8 APG, 1.2 SPG, 0.2 BPG
SG SR Tyler Whitfield Cal State Fullerton 21.7 PPG, 5.1 RPG, 1.8 APG, 0.8 SPG, 0.3 BPG
PG JR Jerrod Sandy Cal State Fullerton 6.7 PPG, 2.8 RPG, 4.7 APG, 1.9 SPG, 0.1 BPG
All-league 2nd Team:
C JR Heath Brown Cal Poly 9.4 PPG, 8.4 RPG, 1.5 APG, 0.5 SPG, 3.8 BPG
PF SR Robert Tran Pacific 10.9 PPG, 9.1 RPG, 1.3 APG, 0.3 SPG, 0.1 BPG
SF SO Claude Cooper Hawaii 11.2 PPG, 4.2 RPG, 1.5 APG, 0.7 SPG, 0.4 BPG
SG JR Grover Vines Hawaii 9.2 PPG, 6.7 RPG, 5.0 APG, 1.1 SPG, 0.2 BPG
PG JR John Johnson Hawaii 16.0 PPG, 2.4 RPG, 3.7 APG, 0.6 SPG, 0.0 BPG
All-freshman Team:
C FR Cyrus Roy UC Irvine 5.2 PPG, 8.0 RPG, 1.3 APG, 0.5 SPG, 0.8 BPG
PF FR Jarod Hicks Cal Poly 9.7 PPG, 5.3 RPG, 1.1 APG, 0.4 SPG, 0.3 BPG
SF FR Kenneth Carlisle UC Riverside 15.3 PPG, 4.1 RPG, 1.6 APG, 0.6 SPG, 0.1 BPG
SG FR Joseph Friesen UC Santa Barbara 14.3 PPG, 6.3 RPG, 2.4 APG, 0.9 SPG, 0.0 BPG
PG FR William Runion UC Davis 6.4 PPG, 1.6 RPG, 1.8 APG, 1.4 SPG, 0.0 BPG
Typical year for us. Snore. Seniors up next.