Cal Poly Pomona rests championship hopes on defense

Reporting from Springfield, Mass. — 

Flashy basketball, scoring plays that make the highlight reel, isn’t the style of choice for Cal Poly Pomona’s men’s basketball team.

Defense is what Cal Poly prides itself on, and it’s the reason the Broncos are one win away from their first national championship.

Cal Poly (27-6) plays second-ranked Indiana (Pa.), which is 33-2, at 10 a.m. PDT Saturday in the NCAA Division II title game at the MassMutual Center.

The game will be televised live on CBS, and the unranked Broncos hope to redeem themselves after losing, 56-53 in overtime, to Findlay (Ohio) in the 2009 national final.

“We do have confidence in our ability to play defense,” Cal Poly Coach Greg Kamansky said. “But IUP has a lot of weapons.”

The Broncos have been waiting a year for another chance. They thought about their final-game loss to the No. 1-ranked Findlay deep into the off-season, unable to shake the memory of the three-point basket that beat them as time expired.

Senior guard Dahir Nasser was guarding Tyler Evans when he hit the shot that broke the Broncos’ hearts.

“We have all the motivation we need for this game,” Nasser said. “We know what it is like to come so close and lose. It took me a long time to get over last year. But now we have another chance to win a championship. It’s a great feeling.”

IUP, which hails from the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference, has a 15-game winning streak. In two games here, the Crimson Hawks are averaging 78.1 points and allowing 64.5 in wins over Valdosta (Ga.) State, 80-64, and St. Cloud (Minn.) State, 76-60.

Senior guard Thomas Young is averaging 16.3 points a game this season and is among five Indiana players averaging at least nine points.

Indiana has had five players score at least 10 points in each of this week’s games.

Balance is something the Crimson Hawks are counting on against the defensive-minded Broncos.

“The key to our consistency is that we can afford to have one or two players have an off game. We know someone else will step up,” IUP head Coach Joe Lombardi said. “Our depth has been big for us all year.”

Only senior guard Austin Swift arrived here averaging more than 10 points a game for Cal Poly. He is scoring about 13 points per game this season and had a total of 35 in wins over St. Joseph’s (69-48) and Bentley (71-63).

The Broncos are shooting 50% as a team and averaging about 64 points while giving up a little more than 56 a game.

Kamansky credits the high shooting percentage to waiting for the right shot.

In the end, though, it will be the Broncos’ defense that will make or break their title hopes.

“We pride ourselves on playing great defense,” Swift said. “It’s all about buckling down and not letting the opponent hit big shots. I know a lot of people are surprised that we are back, but we felt like we had a chance to play for a championship if we played our kind of basketball.”

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