Long Beach, CA—The UC Riverside Men's Basketball Team breathed new life into its 2016 season Thursday with a 77-71 road win at the top-ranked team in the conference, Hawai'i, and the Highlanders now head to Long Beach State in search of sole possession of fifth place in the Big West.
Thursday's win over the Rainbow Warriors pulled UC Riverside into a tie with UC Davis for fifth place, but the Aggies own the tiebreaker over the Highlanders. If UCR is to secure the five seed in the Big West Tournament come March 10, they will need to beat Davis in the standings outright.
| Big West Standings (through Feb. 25) | Big West |
| Team | W | L | Pct |
| Hawai'i | 11 | 2 | .917 |
| UC Irvine | 10 | 3 | .769 |
| Long Beach State | 9 | 4 | .692 |
| UC Santa Barbara | 8 | 5 | .615 |
| UC Riverside | 5 | 8 | .385 |
| UC Davis | 5 | 8 | .385 |
| CSUN * | 5 | 9 | .357 |
| Cal Poly | 4 | 10 | .286 |
| Cal State Fullerton | 3 | 11 | .214 |
| * CSUN is not eligible for the conference tournament due to self-imposed sanctions |
A win over the 49ers at the Pyramid will be a tall order, however. The Highlanders haven't beaten the Beach on the road since January 24, 2009, and Long Beach State is 9-2 at home this season.
Jaylen Bland became the Highlanders single-season made three-pointers leader with his first made three at Hawai'i. That gave him 101 on the year, pushing him past Maurice Pullum whose 100 made threes were the standard bearer since the 1988-89 campaign. Bland finshed with five makes from beyond the arc, on his way to a team-high 20 points, and the senior now has 105 made threes on the season.
Free throws also played an important part in the Highlanders win at Hawai'i as they made 27 of 32 from the charity stripe, including nine of 10 down the stretch to seal the win. UC Riverside leads the Big West in free throw percentage in conference games at 76.5 percent.
Secean Johnson added 19 points for UCR against the Rainbow Warriors thanks in part to a 13 for 14 performance at the free throw line, and DJ Sylvester came within two points of tying his career scoring high with an 18-point effort.
Long Beach State had a six-game winning streak snapped Wednesday evening as UC Irvine upended the 49ers 90-67 at the Bren Center. The Anteaters held the 49ers leading scorer, Nick Faust, to just three points on the night, dropping his scoring average by a half a point on the season from 17.1 to 16.6.
Justin Bibbins did all he could to pick up the slack pouring in 26 points at Irvine, but it wasn't nearly enough to tame the Eaters. Bibbins (11.5 ppg) also averages double figures for the Beach as do Travis Hammonds (10.1) and Gabe Levin (10.0). Levin is fourth in the Big West in field goal percentage at 53.6 percent, while Bibbins is third in three-point field goal percentage connecting on 43.8 percent of his attempts.
The 49ers are third in the conference in scoring during Big West games at 73.4 points per outing, and third in the league in three-point shooting at 35.2 percent. Defensively, the Beach allows just 68.9 points per game to conference opponents, limiting the league to 43.0 percent shooting from the field and 33.7 percent from long distance.
UC Riverside is 11-33 all-time against the 49ers (
view results), but snapped a 12-game losing streak to Long Beach State on January 23 of this year.
