CARSON, Calif. – The Cal State San Marcos men’s basketball team (16-8, 15-4 CCAA) earned a bye and locked up one of the top two seeds in the CCAA Tournament with a 72-64 victory over Cal State Dominguez Hills (10-15, 6-13 CCAA) on Thursday night at the Torodome.
TOP PERFORMERS
Quinn Denker – 21 points | 6 assists | 2 steals | 2 rebounds
Jayce McCain – 15 points | 6 rebounds | 4 steals | 4 assists
Zack Perlstein – 10 points | 4 rebounds
Greg Milton III – 9 points | 7 rebounds
HOW IT HAPPENED
CSUSM took its lone first-half lead at 8-6 as Denker got a layup to fall with 16:21 to go.
Dominguez controlled the lead for the rest of the half after a 3-pointer by Jeremy Dent-Smith put the Toros up 9-8 with 15:23 to play.
CSUDH took its largest lead of the half with 5:44 remaining on a driving layup by David Cheatom to make it a 25-16 game.
The Cougars found themselves trailing 30-25 at halftime after shooting 33.3% (10-of-30) from the field to the Toros’ 45.8% (11-of-24).
Down 38-29 with just over 17 minutes to go, CSUSM went on a 7-0 run to pull within two at 38-36 with 16:08 remaining.
Still down 45-40, the Cougars went on a 9-0 run to take a 49-45 lead with 8:39 to play.
CSUSM took a nine-point lead at 56-47 on two good free throws by Denker with 6:57 remaining.
With the Cougars leading 58-49, the Toros began chipping away at CSUSM’s lead and made it a three-point game at 60-57 with a Jordan Hilstock layup with 2:49 to play.
That was as close as CSUDH came to CSUSM’s lead as the Cougars maintained a cushion of four points or more the rest of the way.
FAST BREAKS
The win guaranteed CSUSM’s best-ever regular-season finish in the CCAA standings. The Cougars placed third in 2021-22 and 2017-18.
With their 15th conference win, CSUSM tied for its most CCAA victories in a season since last doing so in 2017-18.
The Cougars scored 22 points off the Toros’ 16 turnovers.
CSUSM led the game for just over 10 minutes while Dominguez Hills clocked in at 25:34.
The Cougars ended the night shooting 44.2% (23-of-52) while the Toros came in at 42.3% (22-of-52).
CSUSM made 20 of its 23 free throw attempts (87%).
The Cougars stripped the ball away from the Toros 10 times.
CSUDH won the battle on the glass, 35-28.
The Cougars are now 7-5 in the all-time series against the Toros and are 3-2 when playing in Carson.
CSUSM has now won the past three games against CSUDH.
This is the Cougars’ first season sweep of the Toros since 2017-18.
Earning four steals to bring his career total to 138, Jayce McCain surpassed Ethan Alvano’s career total of 136 and now sits nine away from matching Danny Redmon’s school record of 147.
UP NEXT
CSUSM will play its final road game of the regular season on Saturday with a 3 p.m. tipoff at Cal State East Bay (10-15, 8-11 CCAA).
