Nick CamachoComing off of a three-game losing streak, the Cal Poly men’s basketball team handed UC Davis a definitive 79-67 loss in a game that at times resembled the video game “NBA Jam.”
Cal Poly trailed the Aggies for the entire first half, but stayed in the game in part due to guard Chaz Thomas’ catching fire.
Thomas came off the bench to hit all five of his shots from the floor before the break, including three from beyond the 3-point line on his way to 13 points. He finished with 16 points and five assists.
His hot shooting set the tone for an explosive second half in which the Mustangs (7-11, 2-4 Big West Conference) went on a 28-5 run to go from a nine-point deficit to a 14-point lead with just more than nine minutes remaining.
“It felt good because I’ve been shooting crap this whole season,” Thomas said. “But I’m not going to dwell on that and say I can shoot the ball now – I’m just going to keep practicing and working hard and hopefully it keeps going.”
The Mustangs eclipsed the 70-point mark for the first time in more than two months.
Thomas’ backcourt mate, guard Trae Clark, also left his mark in the first half with some aggressive drives to the basket. On one baseline drive early in the game, Clark pump-faked, sending two UC Davis players into the air, and then drove baseline, passing a third Aggie and finishing with a reverse lay-up.
Just as Thomas was “on fire,” the word “Boomshakalaka” came to mind as forward Dreshawn Vance threw down seven dunks en route to a career-high 19 points.
Fourteen of them came in the second half.
Cal Poly head coach Kevin Bromley said that after halftime he “tried to really simplify it offensively.” He added, “I really wanted to come down and really pound the ball into the block and then just go to work. Really simplify it, just old-fashioned three-out, two-in basketball.”
Switching from a mostly man-to-man defensive strategy to a far-spread zone, the Mustangs racked up 10 points off of turnovers and went on an electric 11-2 run capped by Clark taking charge of a fast break and spinning into a lay-up.
After a time out by UC Davis (8-11, 2-4 Big West) and a couple more possessions, Clark, facing away from the basket, dished a no-look, behind-the-back pass to Vance for another dunk. Clark finished with 16 points.
Forward Shane Hanson scored 19 points to pace the Aggies, who shot a meager five free throws for the game.
Even as UC Davis applied a full-court press in the final minutes of the game, Cal Poly did not let up, as guard Lorenzo Keeler sliced to the basket for an easy lay-up.
Cal Poly finished the game shooting 60 percent overall (30 of 50), 50 percent from the 3-point line (8 of 16), and 73 percent from the free-throw line (11 for 15).
“These guys, even though they get beat, they come in and they have a great work ethic in practice and they’re like, ‘Hey, we’re on to the next one and we can do this,’ ” Bromley said.
Bromley attributed the second-half turnaround to the energy of the crowd, and the zone defense’s ability to disrupt UC Davis’ outside shooting.
“If they had started driving, really hurting us inside, I don’t know what we would have done,” he said. “The zone really worked; it changed the momentum of the game.”
Vance said that the Mustangs’ improved second-half play was in part due to momentum. “We were trusting each other,” Vance said of the team’s chemistry. “We were knocking down 3s, getting to the lane, dunking, and we were getting rebounds and stops.”
Cal Poly visits Pacific at 8 p.m. Monday in a contest that will be nationally televised on ESPN2.