{"id":206974,"date":"2026-03-06T07:20:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T07:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206974\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T07:20:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T07:20:08","slug":"beach-comes-up-short-in-overtime-despite-huge-effort-from-rob-diaz-iii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/206974\/","title":{"rendered":"Beach Comes Up Short In Overtime Despite Huge Effort From Rob Diaz III"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2013 Junior <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/rob-diaz-iii\/9431\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9431\" target=\"_blank\">Rob Diaz III<\/a> had a career night, willing Long Beach State to overtime against UC Davis but the Beach couldn&#8217;t quite close out the win, falling 76-70 in OT.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nDiaz III finished with 33 points, 12 rebounds, three steals, and two assists, leading Long Beach State (9-22, 5-14 Big West) in all four categories while also passing 1,000 points scored in his collegiate career, playing 43 minutes in a huge effort. That was matched for UC Davis (18-12, 11-8 Big West) by Marcus Wilson, who led the way for the Aggies with 30 points on the night.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nDiaz and <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/cole-farrell\/9432\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9432\" target=\"_blank\">Cole Farrell<\/a> were aggressive to the basket early, helping Long Beach State open up a 16-10 lead in the early minutes. Hitting the glass strong, Long Beach State had 14 second-chance points in the first half that helped the Beach maintain that edge, even moving out to a nine-point lead on a <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/christian-jones\/9435\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9435\" target=\"_blank\">Christian Jones<\/a> three with just under four minutes to play. The Aggies won the last segment going into the half, however, and cut the lead to three at halftime.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nWith Long Beach State up seven at 48-41, the key run came for the Aggies just after the 12-minute mark as UC Davis went on a 7-0 run to erase the lead. The Aggies then pushed in front for the first time on a Wilson fast-break drive at 55-53.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nDown five with three minutes left in the second half, Diaz canned a three to cut the lead to two, and then as Long Beach State kept getting defensive stops, the Beach went to the junior guard again, tying the game at 62-62 with 22 seconds left in regulation. The Beach picked up one more stop to force overtime for the third time this season.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nDiaz put the Beach in front with the first basket of overtime, but UC Davis regained their offensive spark, going on an 8-0 run to open up a 70-64 lead. A 3-pointer from Diaz III cut the lead back to three with just under a minute to play, but the Aggies hit Wilson to extend the lead back to two possessions, and UC Davis closed out the win 76-70.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nIn addition to Diaz, <a href=\"https:\/\/longbeachstate.com\/sports\/mens-basketball\/roster\/shaquil-bender\/9429\" rel=\"smarttag nofollow noopener\" rev=\"9429\" target=\"_blank\">Shaquil Bender<\/a> also hit his 1,000-point mark with eight points, all coming in Division I in three seasons combined with Manhattan and Long Beach State.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nLong Beach State will close out the season Saturday on the road at Hawai&#8217;i, facing the Rainbow Warriors at 9 p.m. PT on Saturday, March 7.<br \/>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONG BEACH, Calif. \u2013 Junior Rob Diaz III had a career night, willing Long Beach State to overtime&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-206974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206974","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=206974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}