Jan. 24, 2008

Final Stats

Santa Barbara, Calif. - The Pacific men's basketball team improved to 14-5, 5-1 in the Big West Conference with a 71-58 win at UC Santa Barbara on Thursday, Jan. 24. The Gauchos fell to 14-5 (3-3 Big West) with the loss.

It was low-scoring early on, with the teams tied at 6-6 with nearly eight minutes gone by in the first half. The Gauchos were able to take a 15-12 lead with 7:30 left in the first half, and led 17-14 with 6:10 remaining. From that point, the Tigers out-scored UC Santa Barbara 12-0 the rest of the first half, hitting 5-of-8 shots from the field over the final six minutes to take a 26-17 lead at the break. Pacific held UC Santa Barbara to 7-of-29 shooting from the field, including an 0-for-7 to finish the half.

The Gauchos started the second half on a 9-3 run, cutting Pacific's lead to 29-26 with 15:08 remaining. The Tigers came right back with a 9-1 run, including two three-pointers from junior Chad Troyer (Seattle, Wash.) to take the lead back to 11 (38-27) with 13:09 left. After UCSB scored the next three points to cut the Tigers' lead to 38-30, Pacific struck back with a 19-6 run to take the biggest lead of the game at 57-36 with 5:34 left in the game. The Gauchos crept back closer, cutting the Tiger lead to 67-58 with 1:18 to go, after the Tigers missed four straight free throws. UCSB was not able to get any closer as junior Anthony Brown (Sacramento, Calif.) scored the final four points for Pacific to seal the win.

Troyer led the Tigers with a career-high 27 points, including six three-pointers. He hit all three of his trey attempts en route to 21 points in the second half. Brown added his sixth double-double of the year with 10 points and 12 rebounds. Junior Bryan LeDuc and sophomore Casey Neimeyer (Woodland, Calif.) each added nine points off the bench for the Tigers, on a combined 8-of-9 shooting from the field.

The Tigers shot a remarkable 75.0% in the second half, hitting 12-of-16 shots from the field, including seven treys in 10 attempts. Pacific held a 37-27 rebounding edge. The Tigers out-scored UCSB 25-8 in bench scoring.

Alex Harris scored 15 points to lead the Gauchos.

Pacific is next in action against Cal Poly on Monday, Jan. 28 in the Alex G. Spanos Center. It is a special 8:00 p.m. start time for an ESPN2 Big Monday telecast.