Riverside Holds Down Long Beach

Long Beach State waited a year to rid itself of the bad feelings caused by a last-second loss to Idaho State in the 2005 Big West Conference tournament.

But the 49ers’ frustration only grew Friday when they fell to UC Riverside, 57-49, in a semifinal of this year’s conference tournament.

Riverside (15-14) -- which had not become an NCAA Division I team until the 2000-01 season and had not joined the Big West until 2001-02 -- recorded its eighth consecutive victory thanks to 22 points and 15 rebounds from sophomore center Kemie Nkele, plus poise and confidence not normally found in teams where 11 of the players are freshmen or sophomores.

The reasons weren’t in the statistics. The Highlanders, who led at halftime, 19-18, didn’t shoot well (16 for 46, 34.8%) and were outrebounded (43-33). But they stayed patient when they were on offense and played defense well enough that second-seeded Long Beach (18-10) never found any shooting rhythm (18 for 57, 31.6%).

Which is why fourth-seeded Riverside will play top-seeded Santa Barbara today for the conference’s automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.

“I thought if we could keep the game low-scoring it would be more of the type of game we’d want to play,” Riverside Coach John Margaritis said. “I feel now it was a huge, huge step in the right direction.”

As for Long Beach, the regular-season co-champion with Santa Barbara, it was up to Coach Mary Hegarty to dissect another unexpected exit from the tournament.

“Last year, of course I was disappointed. But it didn’t take away from the year,” Hegarty said. “This year I’m much more disappointed because I don’t think we truly lived up to our potential. And that’s something that, as coach, is the worst thing in the world to me.”

Crystal McCutcheon led Long Beach with 19 points despite injuring her right wrist during a hard fall midway through the first half.

Mike Terry

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UC Santa Barbara 66, Cal State Northridge 61 -- The Matadors came back from an 11-point second-half deficit to take a 55-53 lead with five minutes left, but the Gauchos got a layup by Whitney Warren and a jump shot by LaShay Fears to take control down the stretch. Fears, who finished with 13 points, scored Santa Barbara’s first nine points of the second half to help spark an 11-0 run for a 45-34 lead. Jenna Green had 24 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Gauchos (16-12). LaJoyce King had 18 points and a school-record 19 rebounds for Northridge (10-20).

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TODAY’S CHAMPIONSHIP

at Anaheim Convention Center

* UC Santa Barbara vs.

UC Riverside, 1 p.m., FSNW2