{"id":496139,"date":"2026-02-22T05:20:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T05:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/496139\/"},"modified":"2026-02-22T05:20:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T05:20:08","slug":"mens-basketball-erases-deficit-but-csun-holds-off-long-beach-state-78-76","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/496139\/","title":{"rendered":"Men\u2019s Basketball Erases Deficit But CSUN Holds Off Long Beach State 78-76"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2013 Down 17 points in the second half, Long Beach State refused to quit and battled all the way back with a chance to win the game, but two late efforts from <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/shaquil-bender\/9429\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9429\" target=\"_blank\">Shaquil Bender<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/gavin-sykes\/9440\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9440\" target=\"_blank\">Gavin Sykes<\/a> didn&#8217;t fall in a 78-76 loss to CSUN. <br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nCSUN (18-10, 11-5 Big West) had a first half that ultimately proved to be too much for Long Beach State (8-20, 4-12 Big West) to overcome Saturday from the LBS Financial Credit Union Pyramid.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nLong Beach State opened the game hot, making four out their first five shots, all from three, but CSUN was extremely effective inside in the opening 20 minutes. Shooting 58.3% and scoring 38 points in the paint, as Long Beach State cooled off from the outside the Matadors extended their lead into double-figures. A Bender three helped trim the lead to eight at the half, 46-38.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nPicking up where they left off, CSUN would extend the lead all the way up to 17 at 60-43 over the first eight minutes of the second half, but Long Beach State refused to back down.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/isaiah-lewis\/9438\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9438\" target=\"_blank\">Isaiah Lewis<\/a> hit a 3-pointer to kick off a 10-0 run for the Beach, resetting the game for the stretch run. <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/shaquil-bender\/9429\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9429\" target=\"_blank\">Shaquil Bender<\/a> started to get hot, scoring 16 of his 27 points in the second half, first hitting a three to cut the lead to six at 73-67 and then another to bring the Beach within three at 75-72.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nA second-chance three from CSUN put the Matadors back into a two-possession lead however at 78-72. After a trip to the line, another three from Bender, his seventh of the game, cut the lead to two at 78-76. After a key stop, the Beach found Bender again but this time his shot didn&#8217;t fall, and a last-second push up the floor after two Josiah Davis missed free throws also didn&#8217;t result in a basket as CSUN held on.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nLong Beach State will next play a pair of road games, starting at Cal Poly on Thursday, February 26 at 7 p.m.<br \/>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2013 Down 17 points in the second half, Long Beach State refused to quit and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":496140,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-496139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=496139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/496140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=496139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=496139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=496139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}