Jan. 28, 2010
Final Stats
Los Angeles, Calif.- Despite leading for over 35 minutes of the game, the University of San Diego men's basketball team could not hold off a Loyola Marymount rally and fell to the Lions 68-65 on Thursday evening at the Gersten Pavilion.
The Toreros (8-14, 1-5), behind a change-of-pace starting lineup consisting of Chris Lewis, Chris Manresa, Ryan Harbour, Matt Dorr, and De'Jon Jackson, led by as much as 11 points early on in the second half. The Lions (11-11, 2-4) mounted a comeback, however, draining the USD advantage over the course of the final minutes.
Manresa trumped his previous career-high in points by setting a new mark with 15 on Thursday to go along with his team-high seven rebounds. The freshman forward was 7-of-13 from the field. Jackson and Dorr also added 10 points each.
After entering halftime with a 33-26 advantage, the Toreros would go on to stretch their lead to 40-29 with 16:57 to go when Jackson drilled San Diego's seventh three in their first 10 attempts from three-point distance.
The Toreros' advantage trickled down to 42-41 less than four minutes later after LMU went on a 12-2 run, sparked by seven points from the game's leading scorer, LMU's Kevin Young who scored 21 points.
The Lions eventually gained their first lead of the game at the 11:55 mark when they went up 46-45, but the Toreros outscored their conference opponents 15-7 over the next six minutes to open up a 60-53 lead with 6:07 left. Manresa and Lewis combined to score 13 of the 15 points over the stretch, with Manresa scoring eight on his own.
USD missed their next five field goals, four of which were from beyond the arc, while LMU made five consecutive shots, helping the Lions cancel out the USD lead and giving the home team a 67-62 advantage with 34 seconds to go.
The Toreros did have one last opportunity to capture the game, but a Brandon Johnson three-point attempt at the buzzer was off target. USD made only one of their last 10 three-point attempts.
San Diego experienced a much better half of play in the first as they never trailed throughout the opening 20 minutes, building a nine-point lead in the first four minutes of the game after they made four of their first six field goals. Dorr was responsible for staking the Toreros an 11-2 lead when he hit his second three of the game at the 16:19 mark.
Freshman guard Cameron Miles, who scored a career-high eight points in 18 minutes, capped an 8-2 spurt for the Toreros when he hit back-to-back threes to give USD a 21-11 lead with 9:24 left.
USD will try once again to snap their losing streak, which now stands at five games, on Saturday, January 30th when they conclude their three-game road trip. The Toreros will square-off against Pepperdine University on Saturday at 7 p.m.
