Northridge Isn’t Half Bad, Isn’t Half Good : College basketball: Matadors go cold after intermission, fall to Southern Utah in a barrage of free throws, 81-71.

Cal State Northridge used a swarming defensive front to grab an eight-point halftime lead Saturday night, but couldn’t prevent Southern Utah from putting together its best free-throw shooting performance of the season over the final five minutes and dropped an 81-71 decision.

The victory, Southern Utah’s fifth in a row, lifted the Thunderbirds to 13-9 while CSUN fell to 5-16.

“I thought our defense was very effective tonight, but at the same time you have to say that Southern Utah’s offense was very effective too,” Northridge Coach Pete Cassidy said.

“This is as good as we’ve played Southern Utah here since we’ve been playing them--this was better than a 10-point game.”

The Matadors played early like they had no intention losing this one, jumping to a 39-31 intermission lead.

Southern Utah held a 26-24 advantage midway through the half on Donnie McDade’s three-pointer, the T-Birds’ sixth of the 20-minute period. But they managed only two more baskets before the break.

In the meantime, the Matadors took advantage of 11 Southern Utah turnovers to launch a 15-5 run, capped by Brooklyn McLinn’s fast-break layup with two seconds to go.

The lead reached the double-digit mark just seconds into the second half when guard Andre Chevalier connected on a long three-pointer.

Unfortunately for the Matadors, the 42-point CSUN scoreboard mark wouldn’t change again for four minutes, leaving the door open for the T-Birds to score nine consecutive points--including three baskets in a row on offensive rebounds.

Southern Utah took its first lead of the second half two minutes later on Keith Berard’s jump shot, then pushed the advantage to four on Andy Ward’s free throw at the 11:13 mark.

The Matadors responded with a seven-point run of their own, capped by Peter Micelli’s drive and free throw, to reclaim the lead, 57-54, but lapsed into another dry spell, this one lasting three minutes.

Three inside baskets, two coming after steals, returned a three-point lead to Southern Utah. The T-Birds managed only two more shots from the field through the final five minutes, but a 17-for-18 performance at the free-throw line proved more than enough to give Southern Utah the victory.

CSUN did pull to within two with 4:03 remaining on Chevalier’s layup and free throw, and McLinn’s three-pointer with 38 seconds to go left Southern Utah ahead just 73-70.

But four more T-Bird chances at the line and a fast-break dunk by Sean Allen kept the Matadors from coming any closer.

“I feel like we were a little careless on defense with the reaching fouls down the stretch,” Cassidy said.

“We got lazy. We wanted to steal the ball instead of playing straight-up defense.”

Brent Lofton scored a career-high 19 points to lead the CSUN offensive attack. Micelli added 15 points and Chevalier had 11 as the Matadors shot 46.9% from the field to an even 50% for the T-Birds. McLinn and Tom Samson each had four rebounds as SUU took a considerable 36-24 advantage under the boards.