Whittier hands Chapman fourth straight loss in OT
ORANGE, Calif. – Two teams fighting for their postseason lives made for a thriller on Saturday night at the Hutton Sports Center. Unfortunately for the Chapman University men's basketball team it was the opponents who were left standing as visiting Whittier College came from behind to hand the Panthers a devastating 61-58 loss in overtime. The loss was Chapman's fourth in a row – all coming at home.
Whittier (11-11 overall, 7-6 SCIAC) moves into sole possession of fourth place in the SCIAC standings and Chapman (11-11 overall, 6-7 SCIAC) slips into a three-way logjam for fifth place with three games remaining. If faced with a tie, the Panthers do not own the tiebreakers against Whittier or La Verne, but could with Cal Lutheran.
A put-back layup by sophomore F Justin Young at the end of regulation kept Chapman alive and forced overtime, tying the score at 56. However, after the Panthers took a brief two-point lead to open the extra frame, Whittier rallied for the final five points of the game to wrap up the win. A final three-point attempt fell short as the Panthers could not tie it again to force a second overtime.
Earlier the Poets came storming back from a 14-point second-half deficit to tie the game at 45 with 5:34 to play and then took a 50-45 lead less than two minutes later, all part of a 15-0 run in the period. In fact, Chapman was held scoreless for 9:55 seconds until sophomore G Colin Zavrsnick's layup with 3:15 left snapped the drought.
Junior F Tyree Landrum paced Whittier during its second-half comeback with eight of his 13 points coming in the period. Landrum finished with a double-double, added 12 rebounds. The Poets were led by sophomore G Jacob Porter who scored 16.
Chapman never trailed in the first half, jumping out to an early lead as Zavrsnick opened the game with a three-pointer. Zavrsnick carried the Panthers for the first eight minutes, scoring 11 of the team's first 17 points and sparking a 12-0 run that pushed Chapman's lead to 25-10 with 8:27 remaining. Zavrsnick finished with a game-high 22 points.
After losing three-straight games plagued by poor shooting, the Panthers came out with a hot-hand Saturday, converting on 13-of-27 first-half attempts (48.1 percent). Young scored 10 of his 16 points before the break, hitting all five shots including four slam dunks. He added 12 rebounds to finish with his first career double-double.
Chapman hits the road for its next two games against first-place Redlands and last-place Caltech before returning home to host Cal Lutheran in the regular season finale on Feb. 19 at 7:30 p.m.
by Doug Aiken
Sports Information Director
Boxscore: http://www.chapmanathletics.com/sports/mbkb/2012-13/boxscores/20130209_7rsi.xml
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