{"id":84722,"date":"2025-12-07T06:00:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-07T06:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/84722\/"},"modified":"2025-12-07T06:00:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-07T06:00:08","slug":"long-beach-state-drops-big-west-home-opener-to-uc-san-diego-the562-org","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/84722\/","title":{"rendered":"Long Beach State Drops Big West Home Opener to UC San Diego \u2013 The562.org"},"content":{"rendered":"

The562\u2019s coverage of Long Beach State athletics for the 2025-26 season is sponsored by Marilyn Bohl<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to evaluate the Long Beach State men\u2019s basketball team these days. There\u2019s been a lot of growth this season for second-year head coach Chris Acker, but it\u2019s yet to show up significantly in the win column.<\/p>\n

The Beach hosted UC San Diego for their Bold Week Big West Conference home opener on Saturday, and once again there were a fair share of positives against their highest-ranked opponent so far this season. Still, those positives weren\u2019t enough to show up in the form of a win, as the Beach fell 80\u201374 in the LBS Financial Credit Union Pyramid.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we continue to focus and get better in areas that internally we know we have to get better at, and we fix some of the little mistakes we\u2019re making down the stretch or in the middle of games, I think we\u2019ll come out more successful at the end of these games,\u201d Acker said. \u201cI\u2019m obviously not excited about the result, but I love the resiliency of my group and their mindset in these battles.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was another strong night for freshman guard Gavin Sykes, who finished with a game-high 20 points. Sophomore Petar Majstorovic added 18 points and six rebounds, and both players logged more than 35 minutes as part of a starting lineup that once again carried a heavy workload.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur starters played a lot tonight, and at the end of the day I want them to understand that we need all of them,\u201d Acker said. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to find consistency on the roster, where we know that every time a guy goes on the floor he\u2019s going to give us what he\u2019s supposed to give. I think we saw that a lot more in the San Diego game, but we haven\u2019t been whole since that game. Guys just need to continue to get better and step up to make plays.\u201d<\/p>\n

Long Beach State matched UC San Diego in nearly every statistical category, which was reflected in a neck-and-neck first half. The Beach finished the night shooting 46% from the field, while San Diego shot 52%. The Tritons were far more efficient behind the arc, knocking down nearly half of their attempts from three-point range.<\/p>\n

LBSU had its most promising stretch at the start of the second half, capped by an Isaiah Lewis three-pointer that gave the Beach their first lead since the opening minutes of the game. The Tritons responded with their best run of the night, going on an 11\u20130 surge to eventually lead by as many as 14.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe starters gave us a great lift to start the half. My expectation is that when we sub, guys go in the game and the score continues to go up, and it didn\u2019t,\u201d Acker said. \u201cSo we put the starters back in with guys who were tired, and it\u2019s hard. At the end of the day, we had a drop-off in the middle of the game when it\u2019s most important, and you just can\u2019t do that against a team like UC San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Beach had another promising push late in the game as they tried to play catch-up in the final five minutes. A huge three-pointer from Majstorovic even cut the lead to just four with 18 seconds left, but San Diego\u2019s solid free-throw shooting down the stretch left the Beach without any room for a comeback.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are pieces missing on our roster that would allow us to go on longer stretches. There are just things that are hit and miss, and these miscellaneous things that nobody can see but that I identify as a coach and that players have to work through,\u201d Acker said. \u201cIt\u2019s about showing them what\u2019s happening and taking place, and them responding, but also understanding that the game is 40 minutes long. When you\u2019re playing against really good teams, they\u2019re going to expose all of the mistakes you make.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Beach will look ahead to their matchup at San Jos\u00e9 State on Tuesday, and they won\u2019t be back in Big West action until the new year when they host Cal Poly on Jan. 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The562\u2019s coverage of Long Beach State athletics for the 2025-26 season is sponsored by Marilyn Bohl. It\u2019s hard…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":84723,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-84722","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\/84722","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=84722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84722\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}