Pepperdine Requires Overtime to Overcome Gaels’ Defense, 67-61

Good defense and little offense can make dull basketball, and Friday night’s game between St. Mary’s and Pepperdine was drab most of the way.

St. Mary’s matchup zone defense puzzled the Waves and kept Pepperdine from scoring in its accustomed manner. So it was a ho-hum game--until the last four minutes of regulation, when the Gaels rallied to force an overtime. But Pepperdine survived to win its West Coast Athletic Conference opener, 67-61, at Firestone Fieldhouse in Malibu.

Going into Friday night’s game, the Gaels were second in the nation in scoring defense, having given up an average of 54.6 points a game. And they weren’t giving Pepperdine, which improved to 9-5 overall, many good shots in the early going.

The Waves struggled to a 13-7 lead and didn’t score again for five minutes. St. Mary’s Robert Haugen sank two foul shots to tie the game, 13-13, with 8:37 left in the half.

Though Pepperdine came back to lead at halftime, 29-22, Tom Lewis, the Waves’ top scorer, had just three points at the break.

Pepperdine Coach Jim Harrick, whose team had been averaging 77.5 points a game, said that the matchup zone of St. Mary’s was “hard to figure out. I don’t think we’ve figured it out.”

But Lewis, who finished with a game-high 21 points, figured he would start shooting from the outside since St. Mary’s, which fell to 8-4 overall, had been keeping him from going inside.

Lewis made four three-point shots in the second half, spurring the Waves to a 55-45 lead with 4:32 left in the game.

The lead looked safe at that point--but not to St. Mary’s. The swarming Gaels forced a rash of Pepperdine turnovers, and Erick Newman’s lay-in with 1:10 remaining cut Pepperdine’s lead to 57-56.

Levy Middlebrooks sank one of two free throws to give the Waves the edge, 58-56.

But with 14 seconds left, Lewis missed the front end of a one-and one situation, and St. Mary’s got the rebound and got the ball to guard David Carter who hit a 12-foot baseline jumper with two seconds left to send the game into overtime.

In the overtime, a three-pointer by Craig Davis, who finished with 17 points, gave the Waves a 63-60 advantage at the 2:37 mark. And a breakaway dunk by Marty Wilson increased the lead to 67-60. In the final seconds, St. Mary’s made just one foul shot.

Harrick said, “The most disappointing thing tonight was our lack of rebounding effort (St. Mary’s had the edge, 34-30) and the execution of our fast break.”

“We had seven fast breaks that we didn’t execute,” he said.

Pepperdine will play host to the University of San Diego at 7:30 tonight.