LBSU falters in second half to UC Irvine in Big West semis.
LONG BEACH - Long Beach State entered the Big West Conference men's basketball tournament seeded No. 1. But there was never any feeling in local circles that the 49ers would just go in and dominate the field. If anything, the consensus was that the 49ers could beat, or lose to, any team in the tournament.
A year of inconsistency is why that thinking existed. On Friday, it all jumped up and bit the 49ers where it hurts most - the loss column.
Down by seven points a couple of times fairly early in the second half, Irvine slowly but surely ripped the momentum from Long Beach and defeated the 49ers 67-60 in the semifinals.
Fourth-seeded Irvine (20-14) advances to tonight's championship game against either No. 2-seeded Pacific or third-seeded Cal Poly. The winner of that game earns a trip to the NCAA Tournament.
The 49ers (19-13) likely failed in their attempt to get to the Big Dance for the second consecutive season. An NCAA Tournament at-large bid is an extreme longshot, but they will get an invitation from the NIT as the Big West regular-season champion.
Afterward, in the post-game news conference, Long Beach coach Dan Monson did not blame his team for falling short. He said it was "a great college basketball game" and that he was pleased with the way his players competed.
However, when the subject of his team's year-long inconsistency was broached, Monson did not deny it might have played a role. He talked about the
puzzle he had to try and put together with so many newcomers to a team that lost four starting seniors. There were transfers, redshirts, etc."It's who we are as a team," Monson said. "Getting those pieces togther, we never got consistent enough to win three (tournament) games in a row.
"Today was a little bit of a microcosm of this season. We're going to go to the NIT and try and represent our team as best we can. We just didn't execute some things to win the basketball game, and they did."
Irvine led 29-28 at halftime. The 49ers began the second half by out-scoring the Anteaters 15-7 for a 43-36 lead. But senior wing James Ennis had picked up two quick fouls in the second half and then with 14:20 to play in the game, he got his fourth. He was out of the game for five minutes.
By the time he returned, Irvine had crept to within 43-41 and was playing like it knew it could win, though Long Beach did get back up by as many as six points after Ennis was re-inserted.
"I knew once we got a stop and went on a run ourselves, we had the game under control," said Irvine's Alex Young, who led all scorers with 18 points.
Monson was asked about leaving Ennis in after he took his third foul. He said he was about to take him out and replace him with Peter Pappageorge right before he got his fourth. Monson did not blame Ennis for playing so hard that he might have gotten a bit "out of control."
Ennis, who had just 11 points, was almost too dejected to speak. He actually refused to answer one question. But he did bring himself to answer another one directed at him.
"I'm just down on myself a little bit because I let my teammates down," said Ennis, who fouled out with 1:08 to play and his team trailing 59-55.
"I didn't feel like I did my job."
After a 16-footer by Mike Caffey with 4:41 to play, the 49ers led 53-49.
But they were outscored 18-7 down the stretch. Irvine took the lead for good, 54-53, on a 3-pointer by Young with 3:38 to play.
Long Beach still had a shot when Caffey buried a 3-pointer to get his team within 63-60 with 28.8 seconds left. The 49ers did not score again.
Tony Freeland and Keala King both played well for Long Beach, scoring 15 points apiece. Caffey had 14 points and a team-high nine rebounds. Besides Ennis and sophomore Caffey, senior Pappageorge is the other Long Beach player who got a good taste of the NCAA Tournament a year ago. He, too, was really bummed out.
"We really wanted to win this tournament and get back to the NCAA Tournament and get hot and get on a roll," said Pappageorge, who had a rare scoreless night. "This is pretty disappointing."
Will Davis II contributed 14 points and nine rebounds to the Irvine cause. Chris McNealy scored 13.
But if you ask Anteaters coach Russell Turner, it was his team's defense more than anything else that helped it get to tonight's title game with a chance for Irvine to go to its first NCAA Tournament.
"We grinded it out with outstanding defense when we had to have it the most," he said, "especially in the second half."
robert.morales@presstelegram.com
@RMoralesPT
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