Photo by: Tony Leon/ActionWestPhotography.com
THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. - The struggles continued
for the Whittier College men's basketball team on Wednesday evening
as a 32 percent shooting effort saw the Poets drop their third
consecutive conference game, 65-51, to Cal Lutheran.
Whittier (7-9, 1-5 SCIAC) led early but surrendered their lead
at the 14:24 mark of the first half. The Kingsmen converted a layup
to tie the score at 9-9 and took its first and only lead of the
game on its ensuing possession with a three-point bucket.
DaMon Perry converted a layup off a feed from
Willie Mebane at 14:45 to put the Poets up 9-7 but
the Kingsmen responded with a 27-15 run over the remainder of the
half to take a 34-24 advantage into the intermission.
CLU (8-9, 2-4 SCIAC) quickly stretched its 10-point lead to 17
points with a 9-2 run to open the half. Whittier answered the
strong start by their Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic
Conference foes with a run of its own.
The Poets scored 16 of the next 22 points to cut the CLU lead to
49-42 at the midway point of the second half.
As they did all evening, the Kingsmen had an answer and pushed
its lead back to double-digits. CLU lead by as many as 15 points
with under six minutes to play and held on for the 14-point win.
Perry led the Poets with a team-high 13 points. He added five
rebounds and was 3-for-4 from the charity stripe.
Jonathan Saucedo pulled down a team-high eight
rebounds and chipped in with five points and three assists.
Whittier's top two scorers were held in check. Drew
Menez and David Hayashi combined for just
15 points.
The Poets return to the friendly confines of Dave Jacobs Court
on Saturday night as they look to snap their three-game skid with a
conference tilt against Caltech. Tip-off is slated for 7:30 pm.
