PCAA Roundup : Gauchos Survive in Overtime

Scott Fisher isn’t headed for a lucrative NBA contract. At 6-7, he’s just another not-particularly-mobile forward. Just a couple of years ago, Fisher wasn’t thinking about a pro career. He was wondering if he’d ever play again outside of a church league.

He was so impressive at Mission San Jose High School, in fact, that he had to walk on as a freshman at UC Santa Barbara.

Fisher does a number of things very well, however, and Saturday night he displayed them all in front of 2,119 in the Campus Events Center at Santa Barbara as UC Santa Barbara rallied to a 70-67 overtime win over struggling UC Irvine in Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. play.

Fisher scored 28 points--in almost every imaginable fashion--and grabbed 11 rebounds as the Gauchos (7-8 overall and 3-3 in conference) beat the Anteaters (7-11, 2-5) on the strength of their aggressive man-to-man defense.

The Anteaters, who suffered through two prolonged scoring droughts, scored just two field goals in the final 10 1/2 minutes of play and both of those came in the last 13 seconds when the game was all but beyond reach.

And guess whose defense set the tone for the Gauchos?

Fisher, giving up three inches to Irvine’s high-scoring Johnny Rogers, stuck to Rogers every minute the UCI center was on the court and held him to just 16 points in 44 minutes, seven below his average in regulation.

“He’s one heckuva player,” Irvine Coach Bill Mulligan said, shaking his head in admiration. “He hit four in a row (actually it was five) to open the second half from outside and then he went inside and hurt us. He plays so hard all the time.”

Gaucho Coach Jerry Pimm was equally impressed with this superb athlete hiding in the body of your next-door neighbor.

“He really responded to that pop-out offense we used to get him open on the wing against their zone,” Pimm said. “He’s awfully tough from 17 feet when he’s facing the basket.”

And when he’s battling for offensive boards, or denying an opponent the ball, or setting up a fast break with a quick outlet pass, or . . . well, you get the idea.

But Fisher didn’t win this one single-handedly. It just seemed that way. Actually, the Anteaters, who have been playing just poorly enough to lose recently, responded with another lackluster performance and handled the ball like it had been shipped in from a leper colony. UCI’s starters alone committed 23 turnovers.

“We were 12 for 30 in the first half and had 10 turnovers,” Mulligan said. “And then when we went to overtime I was looking at our guys on the sidelines and they all had their heads down like, ‘I guess we’re supposed to lose now.’ ”

UOP 75, Cal State Long Beach 73--Karlwin Mathews hit a layup, and James Ray Richardson added a free throw in the second overtime to lift Pacific to victory at Stockton.

Long Beach held built a 12-point lead in the second half, but Darrell Patterson helped the Aggies tie the score, 65-65, at the end of regulation by hitting five of six three-point field-goal attempts.

Fresno State 70, New Mexico State 59--Mitch Arnold led a balanced attack with 16 points at Fresno as the Bulldogs (10-5 overall) boosted their PCAA record to 5-1. The Aggies dropped to 3-3 and 6-9.

Scott Barnes added 13 points, Jos Kuipers 12 and Kenny Cook 10 for Fresno. Gilbert Wilburn led New Mexico State with 20 points, and Pat Coash had 14.

Fresno State shot 65% in the first half, hitting seven baskets in a row at one point while taking a 38-28 halftime lead.

Utah State 80, San Jose State 75--Greg Grant scored 24 points and grabbed 9 rebounds in the Aggies’ victory at Logan, Utah.

The Aggies (9-5 overall and 2-3 in the PCAA) hit 27 of 34 free-throw attempts, the Spartans (8-7 and 3-3) just 14 of 22.