Canyons Stops Levier the 2nd Time Around : College basketball: Cougars hold Bakersfield’s top scorer to 10 points and reverse an earlier loss, 68-63.

Nobody can say that the College of the Canyons men’s basketball team doesn’t learn from its setbacks.

In their previous Western State Conference game against Bakersfield this season, the Cougars lost by one point because they couldn’t contain guard Tim Levier, who scored 25 points.

On Saturday night at Canyons, they did a number on Levier and beat Bakersfield, 68-63, to remain in first place in the South Division.

It was the seventh consecutive victory for Canyons (13-15, 7-1 in conference play).

By winning, the Cougars opened a 1 1/2-game lead over Bakersfield (12-17, 5-2) in the division.

Canyons has two games remaining and the Renegades have three, one of them a makeup game with Santa Monica on Monday.

“He (Levier) got six threes the first time around against us,” Canyons Coach Lee Smelser said.

“We were really going to pay attention to him tonight and we weren’t going to let him beat us.”

With sophomore guard Alric Gillett shadowing Levier, the Cougars kept Bakersfield’s top scorer to 10 points and only two three-point baskets. Levier went into the game with a 19.2-point average in conference games.

“Gillett gives us quickness and he sets a lot of the pace for us with his defense,” Smelser said.

He also can shoot a little.

He tied teammate Kwesi’ Fulton with a game-high 15 points, including 12 in the first half. He scored eight of the first 10 Cougar points.

The Cougars, who lost to Bakersfield, 69-68, on Jan. 26, trailed, 29-19, with 7 minutes 8 seconds remaining in the first half before going on a 15-0 run to take a 34-29 advantage with 2:07 left before the intermission.

Canyons exploited 11 turnovers by Bakersfield in the half, including several on offensive fouls, to rally for the lead. Bakersfield finished with 20 turnovers, nine of them steals by the Cougars.

“We had a lot of mental errors and that killed us tonight,” Bakersfield Coach Marc Arce said. “We played well until we got in foul trouble.”

The Renegades were called for 21 fouls and Canyons capitalized on many of them, cashing in 17 of 22 (77.3%) free-throw attempts. Bakersfield made 11 of 13 (84.6%) from the line.

Canyons continued to take advantage of Bakersfield’s foul trouble and shaky defensive effort in the second half, building a 65-52 lead with 3:16 left before the Renegades answered with a spurt of their own.

“We felt we could do some things out of our sets offensively,” Smelser said. “We screened very well.”

Fulton, a 6-foot-5 freshman forward, came alive in the second half with 10 of his points. He also had a game-high 11 rebounds. Forward Randy Eason scored 14 points and forward Jagos Medenica had 13 for Canyons.

“We felt that if we ran our offense, eventually we could break them down,” Smelser said.

Bakersfield got 14 points each from center Anthony Jones and forward Ty Gaines, and forward Paul Charles scored 12 before fouling out early in the second half.

The Cougars shot 46.2% (24 of 52) from the field and Bakersfield shot 48.1% (25 of 52).