SANTA BARBARA — There are a number of reasons the Long Beach State men’s basketball team is enjoying its most successful stretch in several years, but team defense has been the backbone of LBSU’s recent run as opponent after opponent found it tough to get anything going.
UC Santa Barbara finally solved the puzzle on Saturday night, shooting 56.1% from the field in an 84-71 victory that snapped LBSU’s 11-game winning streak and tightened the Big West Conference race going into the final weeks of the regular season.
Long Beach (15-10 overall, 10-2 Big West) has a one-game lead over second-place Cal State Fullerton (16-8, 9-3), while third-place UC Irvine (13-7, 7-3) has won seven in a row and hosts LBSU next weekend. LBSU holds the head-to-head tiebreaker over Fullerton because it won their only matchup (the other game was canceled).
Colin Slater finished with a career-high 28 points and Aboubacar Traore had his sixth double-double (14 points, 10 rebounds) of the season for Long Beach, but the host Gauchos found success in the paint and on the perimeter.
UCSB (12-10, 4-5 Big West) went inside in the first half then got hot outside to hand LBSU its first loss since Jan. 8. The Gauchos’ Amadou Sow had 16 first-half points on 8-of-11 shooting, as UCSB scored 28 points in the paint before halftime.
Slater scored 18 points in the first half, as Long Beach trailed by as many as 11 before battling back to trail by just 39-38 at the intermission.
Long Beach took a brief 45-44 second-half lead on a Traore fast-break basket, but Calvin Wishart (18 points, all in the second half) answered with a 3-pointer to spark a 14-2 run that gave the Gauchos a crucial cushion.
The 11-game winning streak was LBSU’s longest since the 2011-12 season and the fourth-longest in the nation going into Saturday’s slate of games.
Ajay Mitchell had 20 points to pace UCSB, while Sow finished with 18 points and nine rebounds and Wishart had his 18 points. Josh Pierre-Louis had 17 points, 11 assists and eight rebounds.
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Slater shot 9 for 20 from the field (5 for 13 from 3-point range), but he and Traore were the only consistent threats for Long Beach. Jadon Jones had eight points, and Joel Murray had seven points and six assists before fouling out. Long Beach shot 41% overall (25 for 61) and was outrebounded 38-29.
Long Beach State defeated UCSB, 65-58, on Jan. 13 at the Walter Pyramid.
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Long Beach State hosts UC San Diego in a nonconference game on Thursday at 7 p.m.