Pepperdine Beats Gonzaga, 69-58, as Polee Scores 17 in Second Half

Dwayne Polee scored 17 points in the second half as Pepperdine rallied from an eight-point halftime deficit to beat Gonzaga, 69-58, Thursday night in a West Coast Athletic Conference basketball game.

The Waves, who trailed at halftime, 29-21, picked up the tempo of the game with a pressing defense and some hot shooting in the second half. The Waves, who made only 36% of their shots in the first half but 63% in the second, tied the score at 50-50 with 6:28 to play when Polee stole the ball and scored on a dunk. Pepperdine took the lead for good on a jumper by Jon Korfas and went on a 12-0 scoring spurt to lead, 58-50, with 2:02 to play.

Polee and teammate Eric White each scored a game-high 19 points for Pepperdine, which raised its overall record to 18-8 and first-place conference mark to 6-1, half a game ahead of idle Santa Clara (5-1).

Jeff Condill scored 14 points and Jason Van Nort 12 for Gonzaga, which slipped to 14-9 overall, 3-4 in the conference.

Pepperdine was coming off its worst loss of the season, a 90-65 defeat to DePaul last Saturday night.