Cal State Northridge Works Overtime For NCAA Bid

By KURT HELIN

Updated 5:44 AM PST, Sun, Mar 15, 2009

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January 26th now seems like a lifetime ago for Cal State Northridge.

At that point the team was 7-10 on the season, 4-5 in Big West play and just had their leading scorer, Deon Tresvan, arrested for trying to rip off a Best Buy with the coach’s son. A few weeks later starting point guard Josh Jenkins was in a car accident that ended his season.

Contrast that with March 14, when Northridge never trailed — but certainly didn’t have an easy time of it — defeating Pacific 71-66 to earn the school its second trip to the NCAA Tournament ever.

It got there on the back of Rodrigue Mels, who scored 23 points to lead the Matadors. That was Mels per-game average the second half of the season, when he took charge of a team that was without a scoring leader or floor general.

Early on it didn’t look like Mels or anyone else would need to come up with late game heroics in the Big West championship game. After a sloppy first four minutes. the Matadors went on an 11-0 run to take a comfortable lead, at one point that got up to 25-8.

They did it with what has become Northridge’s trademark style — high pressure defense that jumps the passing lanes, with a fast-break offense that got into the paint with dribble penetration against Pacific all night long.

But the Tigers battled back, slowly chipping away at the lead and getting back into it, in part because the Matadors struggled with Pacific’s zone defense. The game was tied with 11:08 left at 42-42, but a 9-0 Northridge run gave them the lead.

Still, the Matadors could never pull away. With the game on the line at the end of regulation and Northridge up two, Michael Kirby drive to the hoop and drew the foul, on a call that had Northridge coach Bobby Braswell up and complaining. Kirby sank both shots and the game was headed to overtime at 61-61.

The game was tied at 64-64 midway through the overtime when Northridge’s Rob Haynes hit a tough bank shot, followed by a running three pointer from Mels, and suddenly the Matadors were up five with 1:29 left. They were able to hang on for the win.

This is the first ever Big West Tournament title for Northridge, who also won the regular season crown. This is only the second time for the school in the NCAA Tournament, having gone in 2001 as the champions of the Big Sky conference.