Hair-Raising Finish Falls Short for CLU in 7th Loss in a Row

With Steve deLaveaga sporting a new crew cut Tuesday night, it would have been fitting had the Cal Lutheran men’s basketball team adopted a new look as well.

But unfortunately for the Kingsmen, deLaveaga’s haircut was all that was new or different about Cal Lutheran.

The Kingsmen squandered an early lead, then staged a late rally before falling, 83-79, to Fresno Pacific in a Golden State Athletic Conference game at Cal Lutheran. It was the Kingsmen’s seventh consecutive setback since Dec. 17.

With the loss, Cal Lutheran dropped to 6-11, 0-3 in GSAC play and dropped even further out of contention for the conference title.

“I’m elated,” Fresno Pacific Coach John Moore said. “I kept saying to myself, ‘When are we going to be done with these guys.’ DeLaveaga is such a great player he just scared the pants off me whenever he got the ball.”

The Kingsmen’s rally in the last 5 minutes had both Moore and the Sunbirds worried. After trailing by 10 points midway in the second half, Cal Lutheran closed to within a point in the final 3 minutes. Fresno Pacific padded its lead to 5 points before Cal Lutheran again rallied.

After DeLaveaga’s 3-point shot from behind the free-throw line cut the deficit to 81-79 with 14 seconds left, the Kingsmen were forced to foul and Donnie Johnson, who scored a team-high 21 points, made 2 free throws to give Fresno Pacific its winning margin.

“We pushed it to the end, but we could not execute on a couple of our big shots when we needed to,” said deLaveaga, who led all scorers with 31 points. “We dug such a deep hole for ourselves that we could not get out of it.”

Cal Lutheran jumped ahead at the outset and held a 7-point lead midway in the first half. The Sunbirds moved in front, 33-32, with 3:19 left in the first half and never trailed again.

Cal Lutheran was behind by only 4 points at halftime, 38-34, but could not overcome that deficit as both teams scored 45 points in the second period.

Three Kingsmen scored in double figures, including Mike Demeter with 18 points and Charles Jackson with 10. John Liddell had 19 points for Fresno Pacific (12-4, 3-0) and Troy Brown added 14.

Fresno Pacific remains undefeated in conference play along with Westmont College and Southern California College.