ANAHEIM — The Black and Blue rivalry between the Long Beach State and UC Irvine men’s basketball teams spilled into the semi-finals of the Big West Conference tournament Friday night at Honda Center.
The Anteaters took a one-point lead into halftime, but were unable to stop the second half onslaught of the 49ers.
The ‘Niners defeated UCI 68-57 to advance to their third straight Big West tournament championship game.
LBSU head coach Dan Monson said that his team played well enough to beat the ‘Eaters, but will need to play much better on Saturday in order earn the automatic NCAA tournament berth.
“Great teams don’t play great every day,” he said. Great teams find different ways [to win], and they did that today.”
Monson added: “As frustrated as we were early, I was really proud of the way we stayed together. Basketball is a contagious game, and I told them at halftime it’s okay if a couple of you are struggling, but we can’t have all of you struggling. I thought Edis [Dervisevic] came in and settled us down.”
UCI extended its one-point halftime lead to four, 39-35, with 15:49 to play in the contest, and that’s when the ‘Niners turned on the offense.
LBSU mounted an 18-4 run from that began at 14:57 and ended with 9:41 left in the contest. The run gave The Beach a 53-43 lead in which the 49ers would not relinquish on their way to the 11-point victory.
Monson said that the game could’ve gotten out of hand if his squad didn’t pull together in the end.
“They [LBSU] showed big character today.” he said. “It was a hard-fought game, and Irvine had a lot to do with that. I thought they came out much more ready than we were and much more aggressive than we were.”
The ‘Eaters jumped out to an early 9-0 lead over the first three minutes of the contest, prompting Monson to pull senior forwards T.J. Robinson and Eugene Phelps from the game, he also pulled junior wing James Ennis.
Senior guard Casper Ware said he wasn’t concerned about the early deficit because he and his team didn’t want to have the same feeling they had in their loss to UC Santa Barbara last season.
“It reminded me of Santa Barbara [last season], and we couldn’t have that happen again,” he said. “I wasn’t too concerned because I felt like we didn’t want to have that feeling again. I needed to get my team motivated and get them back where we needed to be.”
Ware did just as he said, leading all scorers with 22 points. The senior connected on 7 of his 14 shot attempts, including 3 of 9 from 3-point range.
After a tough first half, Ennis scored eight of his 13 points in the second period. The junior also pulled down 10 rebounds. Freshman guard Mike Caffey pitched in 11 points on 4 of 10 shooting, including 3 of 6 from behind the arc.
Senior forward T.J. Robinson picked up another double-double, scoring 11 points while grabbing 10 rebounds. Senior forward Edis Dervisevic scored eight points on 4 of 5 shooting while grabbing five points and dishing out a game-high five assists.
Ware led all scorers in the opening period with 15 points on 5 of 10 shooting, including 2 of 6 from 3-point range. The rest of the LBSU squad were just 4 of 22 from the field in the first half.
UCI used a well-balanced scoring attack to take a 28-27 lead into halftime. Michael Wilder led the Anteaters with 12 points on 4 of 6 shooting, including 2 of 4 from 3-point range. Chris McNealy scored six points on 2 of 5 shooting including 2 of 4 from behind the arc.
Wilder and Daman Starring each scored 15 points for the Anteaters on a combined 10 of 19 shooting, including 8 of 14 from 3-point range.
LBSU will face UC Santa Barbara in the championship game of the Big West tournament Saturday at 7 p.m. The 49ers are 1-4 all-time in Big West title games against the Gauchos.