Toros Struggle in Final Minutes and Lose, 65-62 : Basketball: Cal State Los Angeles’ Tony McGee makes two free throws with 28 seconds left as Golden Eagles hang on for victory.

The circumstances put Cal State Los Angeles’ Tony McGee in his desired situation. The circumstances also dictated no alternative for Cal State Dominguez Hills.

McGee made two free throws with 28 seconds left Saturday night to lift Cal State L.A. to a 65-62 victory over the Toros in a California Collegiate Athletic Assn. game at Dominguez Hills.

“It was just like I do in practice,” the 6-foot-8 senior center said. “I love situations like this. I love the pressure and that’s what it’s all about.”

Trailing, 63-62, Dominguez Hills wasted three opportunities to take the lead in the final two minutes.

An errant pass by Al Kiilehua gave the Golden Eagles’ possession with 48 seconds left. The Toros eventually fouled McGee to send him to the line.

“McGee was one of the ones we didn’t want to foul,” Dominguez Hills Coach Dave Yanai said. “He’s not the type of guy to pass up the ball anyway, but he was going to hold it until somebody was going to foul him.

“We didn’t have the luxury of picking who to foul. We had to have a possession.”

After McGee’s free throws, Dominguez Hills called timeout with 16 seconds left. But Vincent Washington’s three-point shot from the left side of the key was long.

McGee, the Golden Eagles’ leading scorer before missing three games because of a sprained ankle, finished with a game-high 18 points. Marcus Williams had 14 and Derek Knowles 11 for Cal State L.A.

“We were playing 10 feet off of (Washington) the whole game,” Cal State L.A. forward Mark Greene said about Washington, who moved into ninth on the Dominguez Hills’ scoring list in a victory over Cal Poly Pomona on Thursday. “He couldn’t shoot. It didn’t look like it was going to go in. The ball seemed liked it was 20 seconds in the air, it was in slow motion.”

The same could be said about the Toro offense, which failed to score in final two minutes 57 seconds.

Dominguez Hills made only eight of 29 shots from the field in the first half (27.6%) and 23 of 54 in the game (42.6%). The Toros have shot below 43% in three of five games.

Kiilehua made two free throws to put Dominguez Hills ahead, 62-61, with 2:57 to play, but Aaron Lattimore put the Golden Eagles ahead for good on a jump shot 16 seconds later.

Cal State L.A., which hung on for a one-point victory against Chapman in its conference opener on Thursday and finished 10-17 last season,, improved to 10-2 and 2-0 in conference to equal last season’s win total.

The loss snapped Dominguez Hills’ five-game winning streak. The Toros, who had won seven of the last 11 meetings between the schools, is 9-3 and 1-1.

A tip-in by Greene gave Cal State L.A. a 55-49 lead with 8:44 to play, but the Toros rallied to go ahead, 58-56, on a three-point basket by Raymond Bennett a little more than three minutes later.

The lead was short-lived. Greene made a three-point basket and Lorenzo Ball scored on a layup to put the Golden Eagles ahead, 61-60, with 3:20 left.

Bennett had a team-high 16 points for Dominguez Hills. Chris Thompson added 12 and Kiilehua had 10.

After trailing by as many as nine points twice in the first half, Bennett made a 19-foot jump shot at the end of the first half to cut the deficit to 31-25 at halftime.

The Toros made only eight of 29 shots (27.6%) from the field.

Dominguez Hills went scoreless for 5:02 during which the Golden Eagles, aided by four Toro turnovers, scored 13 consecutive points to open a 17-8 lead.

Williams scored seven of his 11 first-half points, including two three-point baskets, during the span.

Bennett brought the Toros to within, 27-23, on a jump shot from the top of the key with 3:03 left before halftime. But Williams made a baseline jump shot and McGee scored on a short hook shot to extend Cal State L.A.’s lead to 31-23.