Fullerton Holds Off Charge by Long Beach

For a while in the first half, the game Cal State Fullerton played hardly resembled basketball.

“We sort of took it back into the Naismith era,” Titan Coach Bob Hawking said.

But the Titans came alive in the second half Thursday night and went on to a 66-64 overtime victory over Long Beach State in front of 1,127 in Titan Gym. The loss was only the second for the 49ers (7-9) in six Big West Conference games. It was the second Big West victory in five games for Fullerton (8-7).

The Titans shot only 26% and made 13 turnovers in the first half before turning their game around in the second half. Fullerton shot 51% in the second half and cut their turnovers to six.

Ike Harmon scored a season-high 22 points, with the big basket coming on a jump shot with 48 seconds left in the overtime that gave Fullerton a 65-62 lead.

The 49ers came back on a basket by Antrone Lee that cut the deficit to a point with 11 seconds to play, but Kenroy Jarrett made the second of two free throws a little more than a second later to restore a two-point Titan lead.

That held for the Titan victory after Harmon blocked a shot by Charles O’Neal, and Mate Milisa missed a desperation three-point try in the final seconds.