Gauchos collapse against CSUN and lose in overtime at the ‘Blunderdome.’
UC SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (KEYT) - The Gauchos had all the momentum and then they let the Matadors off the hook with a series of late blunders at the Thunderdome.
Northridge scored 4 points in five seconds late in regulation and went on to edge UCSB in overtime 85-83. The win allows CSUN(17-10, 10-5) to leap ahead of the Gauchos(17-10, 10-6) for third place in the Big West.
Tied at 69 UCSB freshman CJ Shaw buried a three-pointer with 47 seconds left. He finished with a team-high 22 points.
Aidan Mahaney added two free throws to put UCSB up 74-69 with 32 seconds remaining.
The Matadors had no time outs but they got a break when Gauchos head coach Joe Pasternack used one of his two remaining time outs to set up is defense.
But it allowed the Matadors to run a well-designed full court offensive play and Larry Hughes II drained a three-pointer with 26 seconds left to pull the Matadors within 74-72.
Mahaney hit two more free throws after he was fouled with 24.8 seconds left and UCSB led by 4.
This time Pasternack did not call time out and the Matadors went down the court and Hughes II missed his three-point attempt. But Colin Smith was beaten to the rebound by Joshua O'Garro who grabbed the ball and scored the layup with 15.9 seconds to go.
No time out was called by UCSB and Smith inbounded the ball into the corner to Shaw who was immediately trapped by two defenders. His attempted pass back to Smith was stolen by Josiah Davis who fed a wide open Grady Lewis under the basket and he tied the game at 76.
Mahaney missed an off-balance driving shot as time expired and the game went to overtime at 76.
Josiah Davis scored 5 of his game-high 31 points in overtime and CSUN escaped with the two-point win after Zion Sensley missed a three-pointer before the buzzer sounded.
The Gauchos threw away what would have been a nice home win due to a questionable time out, a failed defensive rebound and a turnover, all in the final 32 seconds of the game.
