LA JOLLA, Calif. — The UC Riverside Men's Basketball fell in overtime, 83–82, to UC San Diego Saturday evening. 
 

Zyon Pullin led the way for the Highlanders with 19 points on eight-of-11 shooting to go with six assists and three rebounds. Arinze Chidom had 19 points of his own and grabbed five boards in the loss. The Highlanders are now 10-6 overall, and still 5-3 in league play as the games versus the Tritons are consider non-conference. They moved to 5-8 overall, 2-6 vs. Big West competition.
 

A night after knocking down 14 threes on 29 attempts in La Jolla, UCR struggled to find their shooting stroke as they went 6‐20 from distance. The Tritons, however, connected on 15 of their 30 attempts from beyond the arc led Gabe Hadley, who hit on six of his 11 attempts. He hit the game-winning three-ball for UCSD, and also connected on one in the closing seconds of regulation to send the game in overtime tied at 71.
 

Head Coach Mike Magpayo on the team's offensive and defensive approach, "We had a tough time guarding their shooters. I need to do a better job with the scheme against that team... We wanted to get the ball inside and drive the paint on offense. On defense it was no threes for Hadley—unfortunately we couldn't stop him."
 

Entering the week, the Highlanders were among the national leaders in field goal percentage defense holding opponents to 38 percent shooting (5th) and in scoring defense allowing just 61.1 points per game (10th). In the past 3 games UCR opponents have scored an average of 77 points, 73 in regulation, and shot over 48 percent from the field. 

"We just haven't gotten settled defensively in the last three games. We have to get back to our core of who we are, which is a great defensive team. I know our guys will put the work in and we will find a way to get better." said Magpayo. 

UP NEXT

UC Riverside hosts it's second nationally televised game this season on Friday, February 26th at 8pm, when they'll battle league leading UC Santa Barbara live on ESPN2.