LONG BEACH \u2014 The Long Beach\u00a0State men\u2019s basketball team erased a 17-point second-half deficit to pull even with UC Santa Barbara in the closing minutes, but Petar Majstorovic\u2019s final shot couldn\u2019t send the game to overtime as the Gauchos held on for a 74-71 win at the Pyramid.<\/p>\n
Majstorovic scored 19 of his 21 points in the second half to pace Long Beach (8-13 overall, 4-5 Big West) and spark the comeback bid. Isaiah Lewis scored 16 and Shaquil Bender added 15 points for LBSU, while Leopold Levillain contributed eight points and seven rebounds.<\/p>\n
UCSB (13-7 overall, 6-3 Big West) shot 59% from the field in the first half, including a 7-for-12 showing from 3-point range, to build a 44-29 lead by halftime.<\/p>\n
The Gauchos\u2019 lead was at 17 points with less than 16 minutes left in the second half, but Long Beach found some renewed energy. Majstorovic got the hosts rolling with a three-point play, then scored two quick baskets trim the margin to 10 points in just minutes.<\/p>\n
A jumper from Lewis got Long Beach within 56-51, and while the Gauchos answered to push the margin back to 10 points at 65-55, LBSU responded with a 7-0 run. Bender scored five quick points with a 3-pointer and a layup, then Leopold Levillain chipped in with a drive to cut the Gauchos\u2019 lead to 65-62.<\/p>\n
Long Beach knotted the score at 67-all on a Bender 3-pointer with 2:54 left that sent the arena into a frenzy. UCSB kept its composure and took a 71-67 lead, but LBSU pulled back within 72-71 on a Lewis mid-range jumper with 36 seconds left.<\/p>\n
Senior guard Aidan Mahaney danced around the paint to get a layup that gave the Gauchos a three-point lead with 10 seconds left, before Majstorovic missed on his potential tying 3-point attempt in the final seconds.<\/p>\n
Mahaney finished with 21 points on 8-of-13 shooting (3 for 5 from 3-point range) for UCSB, which won its fourth in a row and beat Long Beach for the eighth consecutive time. Colin Smith and CJ Shaw each added 11 points for the Gauchos.<\/p>\n
The last five games between Long Beach and UCSB at the Pyramid have been decided by five points or less.<\/p>\n
UP NEXT<\/p>\n
Long Beach plays at UC Riverside on Thursday at 7 p.m.<\/p>\n
BIG WEST STANDINGS<\/p>\n
Through Saturday, Jan. 24<\/p>\n
Team \u2013 Overall, Big West<\/p>\n
Hawaii \u2013 15-4, 7-2<\/p>\n
UC Irvine \u2013 14-7, 7-2<\/p>\n
UC Santa Barbara \u2013 13-7, 6-3<\/p>\n
UC San Diego \u2013 15-6, 5-4<\/p>\n
UC Davis \u2013 12-8, 5-4<\/p>\n
Cal State Fullerton \u2013 10-12, 5-5<\/p>\n
Long Beach State \u2013 8-13, 4-5<\/p>\n
Cal State Northridge \u2013 11-10, 4-5<\/p>\n
Cal Poly (SLO) \u2013 7-14, 3-6<\/p>\n
Cal State Bakersfield \u2013 8-13, 2-7<\/p>\n
UC Riverside \u2013 7-14, 2-7<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH \u2014 The Long Beach\u00a0State men\u2019s basketball team erased a 17-point second-half deficit to pull even with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44956,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[29668,4213,1327,131,133,132,26758,127],"class_list":["post-148976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-big-west-conference","tag-college-basketball","tag-college-sports","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news","tag-long-beach-state-sports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148976\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}