Waves crash on upset minded Broncos
By Jack Ferdon
It was a week of Westphals for Santa Clara. First, Coach Paul Westphal led his Pepperdine squad to a 74-67 victory over the Broncos. Then, Santa Clara senior forward Jason Westphal and front court-mate junior Steve Ross carried the Broncos to a 74-64 win over Loyola Marymount.
Pepperdine's Westphal, who was coaching in the NBA last year, adjusted to a halftime deficit by switching his defense from a full-court press to a straight-up zone. Santa Clara (8-11, 3-3) has had problems breaking the press this year, but they handled it with ease against the West Coast Conference-leading Waves (13-6, 6-0) and led 41-32 at the half.
Initially, the Broncos were unfazed by the change in defense and still held a seven-point lead with 14 minutes remaining in the game. But then Pepperdine guard Terrance Johnson grabbed a loose ball in the back court and took it all the way to the hoop, jamming it home over two Santa Clara defenders. This drew a buzz from the 1,444 in attendance at the Leavey Center and started a 23-5 Waves run over the next seven minutes that put the game out of reach.
"They went on a run and we just made stupid mistakes," Broncos' forward Justin Holbrook said, who had nine points and five rebounds in the game.
Santa Clara Assistant Coach Steve Seandel gave credit to Westphal for his offensive game plan, which relied on Pepperdine's superior quickness and hops.
"It takes an awful lot to let your team just play, and that's what he did," Seandel said.
As for the defensive adjustment at halftime: "They played zone and we just stood there," Seandel said.
It was a rough offensive outing for the Broncos. The team went 11 of 21 from the foul line and sophomore point guard Kyle Bailey had trouble with the opposing defense all night long, going 1-12 from the field.
The only bright spot was the play of freshman Jordan Legge, who is quickly emerging as the team's best big man. Legge had 17 points on 8-10 shooting as well as eight rebounds against a good Pepperdine front court.
"(Legge) has an advantage in that he's very bright," Head Coach Dick Davey said. "He understands the game better than most. He understands scouting reports better than most. He knows how to get open better than most."
After the loss to Pepperdine, the Broncos needed to beat LMU to stay in the middle of the pack in the WCC standings. But the game started out as if neither team wanted to win. There was no scoring for the first four minutes until Westphal broke away for a dunk. He also had ten boards in a first half that was marked by horrible field goal shooting by both teams. Santa Clara led 26-20 at the break.
The shots began to fall for the Broncos in the second half as Ross scored 24 of his game-high 31 points. Santa Clara pushed its lead up to as much as 16 and never trailed the entire half.
Westphal, who started his third game in a row after being buried in the playing rotation a month ago, finished with 13 boards, the best rebounding performance by a Bronco this season.
"We got back from one road trip and had some bang-'em'up practices where Westphal played well, so we put him in there," Seandel said.
"I went after it harder, wanted it more," Westphal said of his performance against LMU. "It didn't seem like they were playing hard. I don't know. Maybe it was just one of those games for us."