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ANAHEIM — Never before has UC Irvine been a part of March Madness but an upset of top-seeded Long Beach State in the Big West Conference tournament semifinal round secured the fourth-seeded Anteaters a shot at history.
In a hard-fought battle Friday afternoon at the Honda Center, UC Irvine (20-14) took the the three-time defending Big West champions down to the wire and emerged victorious, topping The Beach 67-60 to advance to Saturday's championship game.
UC Irvine will play in the Big West tournament championship game for just the fourth time in school history with a chance to make its first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament.
"I told them they have the coach of the year and the player of the year and deservedly so," said Irvine head coach Russell Turner. "But tonight, we had the better team."
Alex Young led the Anteaters with 18 points and four assists while Will Davis II finished with 14 points, nine rebounds and a trio of big blocks.
Long Beach (19-13) saw the biggest contributions from Keala King (15 points, eight rebounds) and Tony Freeland (15 points, six rebounds). Mike Caffey had one of the most complete efforts of the game with 14 points, nine boards and four assists.
James Ennis, the Big West Player of the Year was limited to just 11 points in foul trouble.
"A huge key was James getting that fourth foul," said Dan Monson, who was named Big West Coach of the Year earlier this week. "I thought his energy was unbelievable he probably wanted it so much that he got out of control a couple of times."
"I'm a senior; I'm supposed to help my teammates a lot and I didn't do that," Ennis said. "I'm down on myself right now."
The two rivals shot about even, with the Anteaters shooting a slightly better 42.9 percent from the field. The 49ers won the battle on the boards, out-rebounding Irvine 40-28, an advantage that helped overcome Anteater runs in both halves. But defensive stops in crucial times in the second half helped UCI go on top of the 49ers and hold them off for the win.
"Our guys believed clearly that we could make the stops. To make the stops we had to make the rebounds and that's what got us in trouble in the first half," Turner said. "Tonight's game was like a lot of our games and it was close and we grinded it out with outstanding defense when we had to have it the most."
Irvine held a clear advantage before the half until a questionable call at the buzzer cooled the rally.
Up 29-28, a Long Beach defender knocked the ball loose and it rolled across midcourt where Daman Starring picked it up, just barely beating Ennis to it. Starring dribbled in and heaved a long three that swished perfectly through the net. The teams went into the locker room with the Anteaters up 32-28 – or so they thought.
While the two teams did make it back through their respective tunnels to the locker rooms, official reviewed the shot and found that Starring did not release the ball before the buzzer sounded and it was ruled a shotclock violation. The teams were brought out of the locker rooms with 0.8 seconds left.
The Anteaters appeared deflated in the opening minutes of the second half.
"I've never had that happen, I've never seen that happen," Turner said. "I thought we were affected a little bit with our intensity level on the boards but we got it back."
Early in the second, a second-chance three-ball by Ennis keyed a 9-2 run in the second half that saw The Beach go up 41-35 at the first media timeout. King kept it going with a layup after the timeout, extending the lead by seven.
But the Anteaters wouldn't stay back for long. The two teams traded shots back-and-forth nearly the whole game until late when Long Beach came up empty on key possessions.
The Beach was trailing by just four points with 39 seconds left when UCI dropped the dagger. Starring drove through the lane and instead of going up for the layup, floated a beautiful pass over to Davis on the baseline who then threw it down over Long Beach's Deng Deng.
The loss was the fourth in six games for Long Beach, who was largely favored coming into the tournament and was a favorite to bust some brackets this season as well.
"We tasted it last year, we knew how good it was," said senior guard Peter Pappageorge. "We're just going to have to show up and treat the NIT as if it were the NCAA Tournament and show some class and represent this university."
