Tigers: No time to panic
Loss has Pacific angry for Titans
STOCKTON - Often it is the seniors who provide the wise words following a painful loss, and University of the Pacific guard Johnny Gray had a few for his teammates after they dropped their Big West Conference opener against UC Riverside on Saturday.
"I just tell them to stay together, keep your heads up," Gray said. "It's a tough loss, but we can't spread apart right now. We've got to stick together."
A kinder schedule would bring a lesser opponent into Spanos Center today, but the lesser opponent just left town with a win. The Highlanders snapped Pacific's 31-game regular-season conference winning streak, and the Tigers will start a new streak if they can't beat preseason conference favorite Cal State Fullerton in an 8 p.m. game that will be broadcast live by CSTV.
"Fullerton is better than (UC Riverside), so we've got our hands full," Pacific coach Bob Thomason said.
The Tigers (9-5, 0-1 Big West) will see a player that Memphis Grizzlies president of basketball operations Jerry West and a number of other NBA scouts have seen several times this season. Junior point guard Bobby Brown averages 19.3 points and 4.1 assists per game for the Titans (8-4, 2-1). According to NBADraft.net, scouts called Brown the best point guard on the West Coast after he outplayed USC's Gabe Pruitt and UCLA's Jordan Farmar in the 2005 Los Angeles Summer League.
"We have scouts at all the games, and from the feedback I get, everyone thinks he has a real chance," Cal State Fullerton coach Bob Burton said.
Brown had a five-game stretch in which he averaged 25.8 points. He can be exceedingly difficult to defend, and the task is made more difficult by the presence of Jamaal Brown, a 6-7 senior forward who averages 17.3 points and 9.3 rebounds.
The Titans went 21-11 last season and won two games in the National Invitation Tournament, but they haven't been the same defensively without second-team all-conference selections Ralphy Holmes and Yaphett King.
Holmes led the conference in scoring and rebounding, averaging 16.9 points and 8.8 rebounds. King averaged 13.8 points and 6.2 rebounds. Their departures constituted a significant loss for the Titans, but the return of honorable-mention selections Bobby and Jamaal Brown was enough to make the Titans a unanimous pick among opposing coaches in the Big West's preseason poll.
The Titans got off to a shaky start and went more than a month without winning consecutive games, but they beat UC Santa Barbara and Cal State Northridge last week after losing their conference opener against Cal Poly.
The Tigers are coming off an embarrassing loss in which they went without a field goal for the last 6 minutes, 23 seconds and failed to score over the final 3:16.
"You've got to make plays, and if you don't make plays, you don't win," Thomason said.
The Tigers haven't lost consecutive games since December 2003. Their impressive run of consecutive conference victories ended Saturday, but Thomason has little time and less interest in bemoaning the end of the streak.
"To get 31 in a row in any conference is unbelievable, so we're very proud," Thomason said. "Maybe we can start another winning streak now."
Loss has Pacific angry for Titans
STOCKTON - Often it is the seniors who provide the wise words following a painful loss, and University of the Pacific guard Johnny Gray had a few for his teammates after they dropped their Big West Conference opener against UC Riverside on Saturday.
"I just tell them to stay together, keep your heads up," Gray said. "It's a tough loss, but we can't spread apart right now. We've got to stick together."
A kinder schedule would bring a lesser opponent into Spanos Center today, but the lesser opponent just left town with a win. The Highlanders snapped Pacific's 31-game regular-season conference winning streak, and the Tigers will start a new streak if they can't beat preseason conference favorite Cal State Fullerton in an 8 p.m. game that will be broadcast live by CSTV.
"Fullerton is better than (UC Riverside), so we've got our hands full," Pacific coach Bob Thomason said.
The Tigers (9-5, 0-1 Big West) will see a player that Memphis Grizzlies president of basketball operations Jerry West and a number of other NBA scouts have seen several times this season. Junior point guard Bobby Brown averages 19.3 points and 4.1 assists per game for the Titans (8-4, 2-1). According to NBADraft.net, scouts called Brown the best point guard on the West Coast after he outplayed USC's Gabe Pruitt and UCLA's Jordan Farmar in the 2005 Los Angeles Summer League.
"We have scouts at all the games, and from the feedback I get, everyone thinks he has a real chance," Cal State Fullerton coach Bob Burton said.
Brown had a five-game stretch in which he averaged 25.8 points. He can be exceedingly difficult to defend, and the task is made more difficult by the presence of Jamaal Brown, a 6-7 senior forward who averages 17.3 points and 9.3 rebounds.
The Titans went 21-11 last season and won two games in the National Invitation Tournament, but they haven't been the same defensively without second-team all-conference selections Ralphy Holmes and Yaphett King.
Holmes led the conference in scoring and rebounding, averaging 16.9 points and 8.8 rebounds. King averaged 13.8 points and 6.2 rebounds. Their departures constituted a significant loss for the Titans, but the return of honorable-mention selections Bobby and Jamaal Brown was enough to make the Titans a unanimous pick among opposing coaches in the Big West's preseason poll.
The Titans got off to a shaky start and went more than a month without winning consecutive games, but they beat UC Santa Barbara and Cal State Northridge last week after losing their conference opener against Cal Poly.
The Tigers are coming off an embarrassing loss in which they went without a field goal for the last 6 minutes, 23 seconds and failed to score over the final 3:16.
"You've got to make plays, and if you don't make plays, you don't win," Thomason said.
The Tigers haven't lost consecutive games since December 2003. Their impressive run of consecutive conference victories ended Saturday, but Thomason has little time and less interest in bemoaning the end of the streak.
"To get 31 in a row in any conference is unbelievable, so we're very proud," Thomason said. "Maybe we can start another winning streak now."
