Irvine, Pepperdine to Meet at Malibu

Bill Mulligan, UC Irvine basketball coach, said Friday that he likes to use zone defenses when he doesn’t have a strong team. But he also said that his club (1-1) will play a man-to-man defense against Pepperdine (3-1) at 7:30 tonight at Firestone Fieldhouse in Malibu.

UC Irvine had a good night in its last game, an 87-80 road victory over Nebraska, as 6-10 center Johnny Rogers scored 24 points and grabbed 11 rebounds.

Mulligan said his team was successful at Lincoln, Neb., largely because they keyed on the Cornhuskers’ 6-11 center, Dave Hoppen, who had been averaging 24.7 points. He was held to 16.

But Mulligan says that strategy won’t work against Pepperdine. “They run really well. And they’ve got such balanced scoring (five players in double figures) that you can’t key on any one guy,” he said.

Forward Tod Murphy is Irvine’s top scorer with a 21-point average. Rogers is averaging 20.5.