UC Irvine Opens Big Lead, Holds Off CS Fullerton, 77-71

UC Irvine opened a 27-7 lead and then barely held on to beat Cal State Fullerton, 77-71, in the Big West Conference opener for both teams before 973 in Titan Gym on Monday night.

Chris Brown led the Anteaters (4-4) with 15 points and Lloyd Mumford added 14. Winston Peterson led Fullerton (2-7) with 15.

Before Monday, the closest eight of Fullerton’s nine players had gotten to the Big West Conference was when Holland talked about it during practice. And in the first few minutes against Irvine, it looked as if maybe these new Titans had wandered into the wrong conference.

The Anteaters scored the first 10 points and had their 20-point lead with 9:11 to play in the first half.

The Titans didn’t score a point for the first four minutes and only managed two in the first six. They committed 12 turnovers, and many of them were unforced. There was Darren Little, dribbling off of his foot out of bounds. There was Greg Vernon, driving the lane, going into the air, and firing a fastball out of bounds. There was James French, stepping into the lane, passing up an open six-footer and passing out of bounds.

Irvine, meanwhile, was scoring nearly at will, with Jermaine Avie getting 10 points. But Fullerton eventually pulled itself together. Guard Chris St. Clair pulled down four rebounds and forward freshman Josh King made three consecutive three-pointers around the five-minute mark. He nearly matched his career-high of 10 points during the 1:44 span. Vernon added another three-pointer and the margin eventually shrank to 34-28. It was 40-30 at halftime.