66-65 Aggies win. Give the game ball to TY and DeBruhl. Our FT defense was great too! The Matadors were only 16-29 from the line.

Who would have thought that we could still win with Pepper in a shooting slump? He only had 4 points tonight on 1-10 shooting. So he only has 13 points total in his last 2 games. He's contributing on defense and assists but we really need him to get back rolling on offense.

Offense is out of sync. CSUN scored 22 of their 29 points in the paint. We are unable to stop their dribble penetration. It's not looking good at all.

31-22 Aggies at the half.

Ooof...the Aggies got drilled today 20-4 by BYU.

Ice cold shooting for both teams as the Aggies trail CSUN 11-10 at the end of the first quarter. The Matadors only shot 22% but the Ags weren't much better at 23% and 6 TO's already.

I’m hoping we can get a top four seed now. — DrMike

I'm hoping for a top 4 seed also but it's going to be very difficult. Irvine and San Diego continue to play well consistently and Riverside, Hawai'i and Bakersfield are playing much better now while we're currently headed in the wrong direction.

It appears that teams have decided that the way to beat the Aggies is to shut down Pepper as much as possible and dog him constantly from start to finish in order to make the rest of the team try and beat them. We're seeing a box and one used on him a lot now and Riverside really bothered him with it in this last game. They were sticking to him like glue, trapping him and face guarding him and they were effective in preventing him from getting into a rhythm.

The Ags average 71.1 ppg as a team. Pepper is averaging 21.1 ppg and Johnson 16.8 so they combine for 37.9 ppg which is 53.3% of our total offense. We struggle to keep the offense flowing when teams are effective in limiting either or both of them.

Les has said that Mani has the potential to be the best big man he has ever coached according to a comment made by Scott Marsh on an ESPN+ broadcast when we saw Mani enter a game for a couple of minutes earlier this year. The key word here is "potential." Unfortunately, he's been injured for the most part of the 2 years since he came here and we've only seen him take the floor in 3 games this year for a total of 14 minutes.

My guess is that he may not be physically ready yet to play extended minutes. I think he would be eligible for another medical redshirt year. Generally, college players have 6 years of eligibility to play 4 from the time they enroll when including redshirt and/or medical redshirt years.

2/17 scores:

Riverside 67 Aggies 61
Long Beach 87 CSUN 73
Santa Barbara 77 Hawai'i 71
San Diego 76 Fullerton 69
Irvine 77 Bakersfield 71

Current standings:

Santa Barbara 77 Hawai’i 71 - Final. Hawai’i is such a different team on the road.

32-27 Riverside at the half.

Off to another poor start…cold as ice, getting ponded on the boards and no offensive flow…

Remember that his extra year was the Covid year though.

Be sure to let us know how these meet ups go if you get to attend a few.

Pepper is now 181 points away from becoming the all-time leading scorer in Big West history. Getting to #1 is not impossible but it is unlikely. At this point we have 6 regular season games left and at least one game in the BW Tournament so he'd need to average 26 a game to surpass Lucious Harris for the #1 spot.

I wonder what the "Finding joy with the ball coach - Peets coffee North Davis" is all about?

I watched them beat Irvine and they were shooting lights out from 3. The final score was much closer than the game actually was. Riverside was up by 20 late before Irvine made a run in the final couple of minutes. They'll be tough to beat if they shoot like that again. Pepper may see a box and one from every team we play from now on too.

The Ags dropped their opener to Seattle 7-6.

My wife and I were listening to the post-game on the radio on the drive home as well and Les said he didn't have a whole lot to say to the team in the locker room after the game. He said that the team was doing most of the talking with each other. He also mentioned that this is the second game in a row where we have not come out with the energy and aggressiveness we need at the start of the game and you know that will not sit well with Les.

I'm sure the team is frustrated right now and it's showing. We got blown out by San Diego in front of the biggest crowd of the season, got scorched in Hawai'i in front of a boisterous crowd and then couldn't finish the comeback in this game after taking the lead by 4 with 5 minutes to go. The Riverside game will be a gut check for us. We have a tough schedule ahead and we need to turn the frustration into energy and determination going forward.

Seven out of the last eight games between the Aggies and The Beach have been decided by 5 points or less and last night was another really good, tough game.

When LB gets it going, like they did in the first half, you can see how beating Michigan on the road was no fluke for them. They have so much length and athleticism and they use it well around the basket. Like Dr Mike mentioned, they have players who can create their own shots and they were draining them even when they were tightly contested.

They were killing us on the offensive boards in the first half also although we did much better in the second half. There were a lot of times when we had a several players in good position for the rebound and they would simply out leap us and snag the rebound with their length and bounce.

We had quite a few blown layups throughout the game and each miss added up against us in the final tally. Missing the easy ones is going to happen at times. You just can't have 4 or 5 of them against a good team like LB.

Teams are trying all kinds of defensive strategies to try and slow down Pepper. He's seeing a lot of double and even triple teams and they're playing him very physical. He's getting bumped and pushed around a lot away from the ball. The box and one shut him down in the last 5 minutes of the game and I think we'll see that defensive strategy used again against him again by some teams in our upcoming games.

Rocak continues to get better and better. He's the most improved player on the team in my opinion. He's made great progress in scoring underneath the basket with good ball fakes rather than rushing the shot and getting it blocked. I hope he'll continue to work on that mid-range jumper teams are giving him. They'll have to come out and defend him if he starts knocking a few of those down.

There are no gimmes in our schedule ahead and 4 of the next 6 games are on the road. Hanging on to the #2 seed is going to be very tough.

Yes, we missed a bunch of bunnies and FT's also. Aboubacar Traore only shoots 59% from the line but he hit 4 critical FT's in the final minute too.