Long Beach State University Athletics
49ers Beat UCR
1/20/2007 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Long Beach Defeats Riverside
Houston Scores 17 In Victory
January 20, 2007
| MEN'S BASKETBALL | 1 | 2 | FINAL | RECORDS |
| UC Riverside | 33 | 32 | 65 | 3-17, 0-7 |
| Long Beach State | 54 | 45 | 99 | 13-5, 4-1 |
| Leading Scorers: LBSU: Kevin Houston 17; UCR: Chris Johnson 16 Leading Rebounders: LBSU: Byrd/Dawson 6; UCR: Christian Soto 7 | ||||
| BOX SCORE | ||||
LONG BEACH, CA-- The Long Beach State 49ers exploded on offense with six players scoring in double figures on Saturday night as they defeated the UC Riverside Highlanders 99-65. The 49ers improved to 13-5, 4-1 in the Big West, while the Highlanders fell to 3-17, 0-7 Big West.
Long Beach State shot an impressive .565 (39-69) from the field, while UC Riverside shot 45 percent. The 49ers out-rebounded the Highlanders 38 to 28. Sterling Byrd and Mark Dawson both had six boards to lead the 49ers.
"We came out with a lot of focus tonight," said Head Coach Larry Reynolds. "We reiterated at the half to come out and play strong the entire second half and the guys did that. I think one of the beauties of our team is that on any night anyone can step up and have a big game for us. Kevin Houston had an outstanding game as did Dominique Ricks. That's the thing about this team, we do have depth."
Kejuan Johnson had a career-high nine assists to go along with 12 points and four steals. Kevin Houston led all scorers with 17 points and Dominique Ricks poured in 15 points. Aaron Nixon had 14 points on the evening, while Dawson recorded 11 points to go along with his six rebounds. Byrd chipped in 10 points, six rebounds, and four steals. The 49ers finished with 14 steals on the evening and recorded 18 assists with just 11 turnovers.
Chris Johnson led the Highlanders with 16 points. Larry Cunningham had 13 points, and Christian Soto chipped in 10 points to go along with seven rebounds. UCR was just 5-18 from three-point range and committed 20 turnovers.
The 49ers jumped out to an early 16-8 lead in the first half after a layup by Byrd at the 13:42 mark. LBSU kept the lead the rest of the way going up by as many as 18 points after a basket by Byrd at the 5:51 mark. The 49ers saw their largest lead of the half near the end of the period as they went up by 21 points (52-31) following a layup by Ricks with 42 seconds remaining. The 49ers took a convincing 54-33 lead into intermission after a layup by Ricks at the buzzer.
The 49ers shot an impressive 63 percent (22-35) from the field and 50 percent (4-8) from behind the arc in the first half. The Highlanders shot 52 percent from the field. The difference in the half was on the boards as LBSU out rebounded UC Riverside 18-9.
LBSU did not cool off in the second half as they went up by 30 points (69-39) after Nixon sank a three-pointer with 15:24 remaining. The 49ers took their largest lead of the game at the 11:00 mark after a three-pointer by Tim Island put the 49ers up 82-42. LBSU cruised the rest of the way as they led by at least 30 points for the remainder of the game.
The 49ers return to action next Thursday, January 25 as they travel to UC Irvine for a 7 pm Big West match-up. The game will be televised live on KVMD.
