Dec. 8, 2005

Box Score

(San Diego, CA) - The USD Toreros (6-2)streaked to their fifth straight win with tonight's dominating 104-57 win over visiting Point Loma Nazarene before 1,380 fans at the Jenny Craig Pavilion. Forward Corey Belser scored 24 of his career-high 28 points in the first half as USD battled to a 47-37 intermission lead. For the 2nd straight game USD turned in a big 2nd half at both ends of the floor to finish with the 47 point victory. USD also set a school record for steals in a game with 19, bettering the previous mark set back in 1982 by two. USD will face Fresno State (4-1) this Saturday in the San Diego Slam at 5:30 pm at Cox Arena.

"I told our team that I appreciated how we defended the last two games in the 2nd half," said head coach Brad Holland. "I liked our intensity and how we picked up defensively. Point Loma is a good team that is well coached, and if Corey hadn't had a huge first half we probably would have been behind at halftime."

Point Loma shot the ball extremely well in the first half and held a 33-30 lead with 5:23 left in the half. A Belser three-pointer, followed by a Nick Lewis three-point play inside, and another Belser trey pushed USD back ahead 39-35 and the Toreros never looked back, builing the 10 point intermission lead. In fact, from the point of the game where PLNU lead by three, the Toreros would end the game outscoring the Sea Lions by 50 points (74-24).

For the second straight game, every Torero that played scored. In fact, walk-on Kyle Price saw his first action of the season and finished with 4 points in 4 minutes, including an eye-opening slam dunk. Other Toreros in double digits included Nick Lewis (16), Brandon Johnson (11 points, 5 assists) and Gyno Pomare (11 points, 7 rebounds). Theo White led the team in the theft department with 4 steals. USD shot 58.8% from the field.

Point Loma was paced by center Tim Kruge (18 points), Casey Ortiz (12 points) and Xavier Lopez (11 points).