67.8% FT shooting team hits 87.5% tonight. That, Pepper going 7-21 and Traore going 12-17 (mostly the latter two) were the difference.

They've got a lot of guys in the 60's on FT's too. Extend the game and make them hit pressure FTs at that point.

Just under 30 seconds left and Pepper comes down and takes a long 3. Go to the basket for a 2. You don't need a three there. Plenty of time left.

I'm pretty sure Davis wants to win just as much as Long Beach does.

Going to need someone besides Pepper and Johnson to score. They've got 39 of our 54 points. And in Pepper's case, he's not shooting well (6-18).

Just keep playing like the did the last 10-12 minutes of that first half and we'll be good.

Playing much better the last few minutes. Not nearly as hesitant offensively as they were at the beginning.

Says will tip at 6:34 on ESPN News. You should be able to stream it if you get ESPN2.

Tough to shoot on tired legs. And if tired legs are going to show, it's going to be on 3-point shooting.

Wonder if they're just running on fumes with this being their fourth game in four days.

1-16 from 3 in the game. Very hard to win a game when you shoot like that.

I'll take it. Only down 2 at the half as the underdog is perfectly fine. Obviously we'd all prefer to be up 15 but we're in the game.

Correct. Men only made it in 2017 and the women should have that year (was the first of our 3 year dominant stretch in the league) but they lost in the semi's as a 1 seed.

KenPom ranks Irvine 77 and us 172. The NET rating has Irvine at 73 and us at 168. That's why there's the huge drop in terms of projected seed.

The three at the end weren't due to not being aggressive. One was Johnson trying to dribble around right under our own basket when he could have passed to an open guy. The second was the pass to Pepper on the inbounds that he fumbled off his knee. The last we actually broke the press and our guy (can't remember who) tried to pass across the court and Hawaii picked it off.

And at the end, three turnovers in the last minute or so.

Yeah, too close for comfort right now.

Second half started just like the first. If the second half wants to end like the first half did - with us winning - that would be swell.

I liked this game a lot better when we were up 16.

Yep. If we make it I assume we'll be a 15 or 16 seed anyway so style points are irrelevant here. Winning each game by 20 or by 1 gets us to the same point.