Big second half lifts Cal Poly over UC Riverside at Big West Tournament

ANAHEIM — You can always make the second half a different story. Sometimes, all that’s needed is someone to do the reminding.

For the Cal Poly men’s basketball team, it was senior David Hanson, who now has his team one step closer in his last look at the Big West Conference Tournament championship.

Hanson scored 12 points, senior point guard Amaurys Fermin had a game-high 16, and the Mustangs (18-11) used a 13-0 run at the beginning of the second half, turning a seven-point deficit into a 66-54 victory in the first round of the conference tournament at the Honda Center in Anaheim.

Cal Poly had only come back twice this season in 14 games while trailing at the half, but Hanson knew to have faith.

“Dave just kept saying, ‘It’s a new half. We’re right there with each other. Let’s play together,’ ” Fermin said as Cal Poly went to the break trailing 34-28, “and we came out with that same positive energy. I didn’t know it was a 13-0 run. We just kept playing with a great poise and great enthusiasm.”

Cal Poly advanced to play UC Santa Barbara in the semifinals today at 9 p.m.

Highlanders leading scorer Phil Martin hit a free throw coming out of the break, and then Cal Poly had 13 unanswered points with Fermin scoring four of his own.

It was a five-minute scoreless skid for UC Riverside (14-17) that the Highlanders ultimately never recovered from.

“I knew we were capable of doing that,” said Hanson, who shot 50 percent from the field and also grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds.“Our defense was great. I think our defense really helped with that, led to good offensive possessions.

It wasn’t about adjustments. Mustangs head coach Joe Callero used the same offensive and defensive strategies in both halves.

Cal Poly switched its man-to-man and matchup zone defenses every few minutes to try and keep Martin from getting comfortable.

Martin had a team-high 15 points, shooting 6 for 13 and 2 for 3 on 3-pointers, but point guard Robert Smith was the only other UC Riverside player in double figures and all 10 of his points came in the first half.

Offensively, Cal Poly attacked the paint against the Highlanders’ collapsing defensive style.

In the three previous games against UC Riverside, including a 70-66 overtime loss in the first round of last year’s Big West Tournament, the Mustangs had been content to settle for 3-point shots.

This time around, Callero made it a priority to force the ball into the paint.

Cal Poly was 4 for 14 from 3-point range, but only former Morro Bay High star Dylan Royer (1 for 7) attempted more than two from the outside.

Instead of shooting from long range, Cal Poly earned huge advantages in free throws, offensive rebounds and second-chance points. The Mustangs made 18 of 20 free throws. The Highlanders only attempted 15, sinking eight.

Cal Poly held a 12-3 advantage in offensive rebounds, turning that into a 14-3 edge in second-chance points.

And for all the “forcing” inside, the Mustangs only committed nine turnovers.

“That was definitely gameplanned,” Callero said. “The 3-point ball did not win the game for us tonight. It was actually our interior passing, our high-low passing, our roll-back passes. ... And then single-digit turnovers was the key, not giving the ball away as well.”

UC Riverside also had a first-half drought that it was able to overcome, missing its first four shots before Smith nailed a 3-pointer 3:21 into the game.

Cal Poly had pulled out to a 5-0 lead on a score in the high post from Will Taylor and a 3-pointer from the wing by Hanson at the 17:28 mark.

Hanson’s was the only 3-pointer Cal Poly would shoot for the next 10 minutes as the Mustangs tried to score exclusively from the inside.

Smith’s 3-pointer jump-started an 8-0 run for the Highlanders that didn’t end until Hanson hit three free throws to tie the score at 8 with 14:21 left in the first.

From that point, the two teams traded leads with neither team able to secure more than a two-score lead on the other for the next 10 minutes.

Cal Poly ended up with a 2-1 advantage in the season series against UC Riverside.

The Mustangs are 0-2 this season against UC Santa Barbara and have not beaten the Gauchos since a 60-57 win in San Luis Obispo in 2010, Callero’s first season at the helm.

UC Santa Barbara has won each of the past two Big West Tournament titles, earning the automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament that goes along with them.

For the first time in those runs to the title, the Big West’s only two Central Coast competitors will face off.

“It’s more than a semifinal game,” Callero said. “It’s a game against the Gauchos and the Mustangs, and the rivalry, it means a lot to our guys. It means a lot to the coaches, the students, the soccer teams and the volleyball teams.”

This story was originally published March 9, 2012 at 12:08 AM with the headline "Big second half lifts Cal Poly over UC Riverside at Big West Tournament."