POMONA, Calif. - Kellogg Gym, where amazing happens.
The Cal Poly Pomona men's basketball team recorded buzzer beaters at the close of both the first and second halves Tuesday, with the final bucket coming from
Tyquan Brown just before time expired to lift the Broncos to a 69-67 victory over Cal State Stanislaus.
Yet another thrilling victory for CPP and this one was witnessed by 1,705 fans, with most of them standing for the final seven minutes of action.
The first-round win moves CPP into the semifinal stage of the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) Tournament. The Broncos will play Humboldt State on Friday at 12 p.m. at host site UC San Diego in La Jolla. The Jacks of HSU topped Cal State L.A. in Arcata Tuesday, 78-75.
"Two-straight wins on buzzer beaters," Broncos' head coach
Greg Kamansky said. "How can you beat that?"
The Warriors had the chance to hold the ball and go for the winner, as the shot clock was turned off and the clock ticked toward the end of regulation. CPP's defense created a turnover though, with
Mitchel Anderson stealing it away before the Broncos called a timeout as 12 seconds remained on the scoreboard.
Out of the huddle, CPP passed the ball into
Dwayne Fells' hands at the post. Two Warrior defenders converged but Fells slipped a slick pass to Brown for a layup just before the buzzer sounded.
"It's just been unbelievable the last few days," Brown said. "I had finally come down from the rush of Friday and now we're back on another rush after this one."
On the heels of the double-overtime miracle shot by Anderson in the regular season finale, the second-seeded Broncos are riding a wave of excitement going into Friday's showdown with third-seeded Humboldt State.
All four semifinals and championship games will be televised live on Comcast Hometown Network and available to Comcast cable subscribers on Channel 104. The broadcast feed also will be streamed live through Stretch Internet at www.goccaa.org.
The Broncos and Warriors played close wire to wire Tuesday, with the largest lead of the game for either team being seven points. Both squads shot well, as CSUS fired 60.9 percent while CPP posted a 52.3-percent mark.
The pivotal point for the Broncos in terms of rallying the home Kellogg Gym crowd came between the nine- and six-minute marks in the second half. As the Warriors' Brett Sayad went up for a three-point attempt, Brown swatted it away to force a shot clock violation on CSUS. One possession later,
DeRonn Scott passed it off to Brown for a dunk that cut the visitor's lead to 51-50.
Back-to-back turnovers on the Warriors on the next to possessions led to dunks on the other end from Anderson and
Matt Rosser, with the crowd erupting and the CSUS bench being forced to call a timeout. From that point on, most of the 1,750 Bronco fans decided to stand rather than sit.
As the clock dipped under the two-minute mark and the crowd began to grow louder and louder, Warriors' star Reggie Jones knocked down a three-pointer to give the visitors a 67-64 edge. Scott countered just 11 seconds with a trey of his own though, locking the score back up.
With a missed shot from CSUS and a turnover from the hosts, the Warriors had the ball with a chance to win it. Instead, Sayad sent an errant pass into Anderson's hands and the rest is history, with Brown dropping in the layup in the final second before the horn sounded and the crowd rushed the court.
Scott led the way on offense with 20 points on 8-for-12 shooting, while Fells sank his first career three-pointer and is now just one shy of 1,000 career points.
Daniel Rodriguez added a career-high 11 points while Anderson totaled 14 points and Rosser contributed 10.