CS Long Beach Defeats UC Irvine

As the fortunes of Lucious Harris have gone, so, generally, have the fortunes of Cal State Long Beach this season.

Saturday night at UC Irvine, Harris left the 49ers’ Big West Conference game after drawing his fourth foul with 13:12 to play. But even when the host Anteaters came back from a 16-point deficit to trail by only five with 11:04 to play, Long Beach pulled away to an 88-74 victory before 3,401 at the Bren Center.

“I think the key thing tonight was our ability to play without Lucious Harris,” Long Beach Coach Seth Greenberg said. “That’s something we haven’t done for some time.”

The last time Harris was in foul trouble was against New Mexico State in last season’s Big West Conference tournament at the Long Beach Arena. Without him for much of the second half, the 49ers lost to the eventual tournament champion, 80-72.

Granted, Irvine (3-10, 5-15) is not the caliber of team that New Mexico State is. Yet for 10 games--since its 64-49 upset of then No. 1 Kansas Jan. 25--Long Beach had been in a slump.

“It’s about time we played like this,” said the 6-foot-5 Harris, who finished with a game-high 26 points and is eight shy of the becoming the all-time Big West scoring leader.

Greenberg said he decided to re-establish the 49ers’ running game because of the 49er lethargy that has been evident for the past three weeks.

The idea worked. The 49ers (17-7, 9-6) opened a 47-32 lead as Harris scored 23 points on eight-for-11 shooting during the first half.

“The problem with this game was that we were not able to make it into a half-court game,” Irvine Coach Rod Baker said. “They kept it a full-court game and killed us in transition.”

Lloyd Mumford, who led Irvine with 18 points, sparked an Anteater run to open the second half. Long Beach led by only 58-53 after Rod Hannibal’s three-pointer for Irvine, but Brian Camper followed with back-to-back layups and Chris Tower made a five-foot shot as the 49ers pulled away to a 75-61 lead with 6:14 to play.