UPCOMING:
Thurs., Feb. 10 -- at UC Irvine, Bren Center (5,000), 7:05 p.m. - KVMD
television
Sat., Feb. 12 -- at Long Beach State, The Pyramid (5,000), 5:05 p.m. -
FOX Sports Net West 2 TV
THE QUICK SCENARIO: The Titans (12-7, 6-4) have plenty to play for Thursday
night at the Bren Center. Not only are they playing their Orange County
rival, but they will be trying to stretch a 4-game winning streak, the
longest in five years (12/11/99 thru 1/5/2000); they will be trying to
compile the school’s best 20-game start since the1982-83 team opened
16-4; they will be trying to avenge their only home loss of the year (a
97-81 defeat to UCI on Jan. 15); and they will be trying to hold onto
the coveted fourth-place spot (first-round post-season tournament bye)
in the Big West Conference standings. They complete a 4-game road “trip”
with games Thursday and Saturday at UC Irvine and Long Beach State, respectively.
TELEVISION: Thursday’s game will be televised live on KVMD television,
Ch. 23 and available on many cable outlets. Geoff Witcher and Don Ford
are the announcers. Saturday’s game will be televised live on FOX
Sports West Net 2 with Michael Eaves and Sean Farnham.
“RADIO”: All games can be heard live on the internet on computers
with sound cards. Listeners may access the CSF Athletics home page at
www.titansports.org and follow the links. Justin Alderson calls the game
at UC Irvine and Todd Reeves is the voice at Long Beach State. The game
at UCI also will be live on Sirius Satellite radio (Channel 138) with
the UCI feed.
PROBABLE STARTERS:
No. Name Ht. Yr. ppg rpg Quick Notes
PF 2 Yaphett King 6-4 Sr. 13.4 5.4 Creating matchup problems at power
forward; averaging 18 pts. last 4 games
SF 15 Ralphy Holmes 6-4 Sr. 16.2 7.3 Three double-doubles in last five
games; career-best 14 rebounds at UC Davis
C 32 Jamaal Brown 6-7 Jr. 12.2 7.8 20-for-37 from the floor during 4-game
win streak
SG 14 Jermaine Harper 6-3 Jr. 10.0 3.3 Went 4-for-4 from 3-point range
in first game vs. UC Irvine
PG 3 Bobby Brown 6-1 So. 16.5 2.2 23-point effort Monday at UC Davis has
him leading Big West scorers again
OFF THE BENCH:
G 23 Vershan Cottrell 6-2 Jr. 2.1 1.1 Played season-high 23 minutes vs.
Cal Poly, 21 at UCR
PG 22 John Clemmons 6-0 Jr. 2.4 1.2 January transfer from El Camino College
who didn’t play last year
F 5 Justin Burns 6-6 So. 3.1 2.5 Had season’s second-best of 9 points
at UC Davis on Monday night
C 42 Derek Quinet 6-9 So. 3.5 2.3 Started first five games of the season;
didn’t play vs. UCSB and UCR
F 21 Danny Lambert 6-6 Jr. 0.7 1.0 Transfer from Irvine Valley College
has played only 17 minutes
SIDELINED:
F 24 Hardy Asprilla 6-5 Sr. 8.5 8.8 Out for the season; tore ACL in his
right knee vs. Long Beach State
F 12 Drew Awad 6-3 Sr. 1.7 1.0 Leukemia survivor sidelined by foot injury
has suffered cancer re-occurrence
C 43 Lloyd Walls 6-9 Sr. -- -- Transfer from Wright State sidelined all
season after multiple concussions
ABOUT THE ANTEATERS: UC Irvine (10-9, 4-7) is 3-3 since winning at Titan
Gym on Jan. 15, but has lost its last two -- at Pacific and Cal State
Northridge. Ross Schraeder leads a balanced attack at 14.1 ppg followed
closely by Aaron Fitzgerald at 13.8 and Greg Ethington at 11.4. In the
previous meeting at Fullerton, UCI shot .589 from the floor including
.643 from 3-point range and .815 at the foul line.
CAN TITANS WIN BACK-TO-BACK-TO-BACK ON THE ROAD? Prior to the last two
games at UCR and UC Davis, you have to go back to the 1996-97 season to
find the Titans winning consecutive games on the road -- at Montana on
Dec. 3 and at LMU on Dec. 7. To find three consecutive, truly “road”
wins in a row, you have to go back to the Titans’ first Div. I season
-- 1974-75 -- when they beat three non-Div. I teams in a row at CSU Bakersfield
(Jan. 4, 64-59); at Cal State L.A. (Jan. 10, 98-79) and at Cal Poly Pomona
(Jan. 13, 61-54). In 1982-83, they won at Long Beach, at UCI and at UCSB
in succession, but the UCI game was played at the Anaheim Convention Center.
Several other times there have been three wins in a row at road sites,
but with home games interspersed among them.
DEFENSE WINS: While the Titans continue to lead the Big West Conference
in team scoring at 76.4 points per game, their defense has been the glaring
strength in the current 4-game winning streak. They have held UCR and
UC Davis to back-to-back 55-point games, lowest by an opponent all season.
And the combined field-goal percentage the past four games by foes is
.412 (87-for-211).
SERIES HISTORIES: Cal State Fullerton leads UCI, 41-37, after a 97-81
loss to the Anteaters on Jan. 15 in Titan Gym. The teams have split the
season series in each of the past two seasons. CSF has played Long Beach
State more than any other opponent and trails in the series, 51-36, but
has won the last three meetings.
THE COACHES: Bob Burton is 23-24 in his second year at Fullerton and career.
Burton is 1-2 vs. UC Irvine and Pat Douglass, who is 116-103 in his 8th
year at UCI, 492-221 career and 8-7 vs. Fullerton.
FLYING HIGH: Barring post-season play, the Titans are done with airplanes
this season. They flew home after a win three times -- vs. Colgate at
Central Connecticut, at Eastern Washington and at UC Davis. Those three
“air” wins match the PAST SEVEN SEASONS COMBINED, to wit:
1-6 in 1997-98; 0-8 in 1998-99; 0-7 in 1999-2000; 1-6 in 2000-01; 0-6
in 2001-02; 1-6 in 2002-03 and 0-5 in 2003-04 for a total of 3-44. Compare
that to this year’s 3-4 mark (also lost to Samford in Connecticut,
at Denver, at Utah St. and at Idaho).
3-2 IN CRUNCH TIME: The Titans are 3-2 in games this year that went down
to the final shot with three different players being the offensive hero.
At Eastern Washington, Jermaine Harper made a 3-pointer with 4 seconds
left for a 2-point win when EWU couldn’t get off a last shot. At
Cal State Northridge, Yaphett King gave the Titans a 1-point lead with
8 seconds left and Davin White missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer for the
Matadors. And vs. UCR, Justin Bell missed a 3-pointer at the buzzer after
Jamaal Brown had made two free throws with less than 5 seconds to play.
Hardy Asprilla’s 3-point play with 51 seconds left was the key in
that game.
RALPHY IS BACK: With the exceptions of his first game back and Jan. 15
vs. UC Irvine, Ralphy Holmes has looked like his first-team All-Big West
Conference (2002-03) self after a one-year hiatus. After a humbling debut
at San Diego State, where he went scoreless on 0-for-9 shooting, he averaged
19.5 points over the next six games including 25 points in 27 minutes
off the bench vs. Denver. His 6-point game vs. UCI was only the fifth
time as a Titan he failed to score in double figures. On the USU-Idaho
road trip he led the Titans in scoring and rebounding in each game including
a then career-high 13 rebounds at Idaho. In the current 4-game winning
streak he is averaging 18.0 points and 9.5 rebounds while shooting 58
percent (29-for-50) from the floor. After the UCI game he will qualify
for the Big West leader board (playing in 75 percent of his team’s
games). He had 14 rebounds at UC Davis on Monday for a career high.
YAPHETT ADDS TO SCORING ‘POWER’: The loss of Hardy Asprilla
has turned Yaphett King into the power forward for the past seven games
and he has improved his scoring, averaging 15.9 ppg over that span with
three games of 21 or more points. He had a 19-point first half vs. Cal
Poly and a 17-point first half vs. UC Riverside. In the five games prior
to Cal Poly, he had been a second-half scoring machine with 56 of his
76 points coming after intermission. Twice he has been the “go-to”
guy down the stretch. Vs. Colgate on Nov. 20, he scored 9 of his 11 points
and 9 of the team’s final 13 (in the last 6:39) to hold off a Colgate
rally. At Northridge, he scored 8 of the team’s final 12 points
in regulation (in final 3:38) and then added 4 more points in overtime
including the game-winning bucket with 8 seconds to play. He picked up
two fouls in the first two minutes at UC Davis on Monday and played only
19 minutes with 8 points.
JEKYLL-HYDE ACT?: Junior guard Jermaine Harper continues to post erratic
scoring totals. The University of Virginia transfer has scored 4 points
or less seven times this season yet he has had three games of 20 or more
points. In the other nine games he has had between 8 and 16 points. After
scoring 24 including the game-winning bucket at Eastern Washington on
Dec. 10, he scored a TOTAL of 6 points on 2-for-19 shooting overall and
0-for-11 from 3-point range over the next three games. Coming off the
bench at Pacific on Dec. 30, he made 9 of 15 shots including 5 of 10 attempts
from behind the arc to post a new career high of 25 points. But then he
failed to score at home vs. UCR, missing all 4 shots in 19 minutes. His
consecutive games in double figures vs. Cal Poly and UCSB were the first
time he had done that since the first three games of the season.
BOBBY BROWN BOUNCES BACK: Bobby Brown has snapped a 4-game scoring slump
with 37 points in the last two games on 13-for-25 shooting from the floor
including 5-of-12 from the 3-point line. He made only 9-of-29 shots on
the USU-Idaho road trip and then went only 5-for-17 (3-for-11 treys) at
home vs. Cal Poly and UCSB. But at UC Riverside on Feb. 3 he made 6 of
10 shots overall (2 of 6 treys) for 14 points and had 6 assists. At UC
Davis on Monday he had 23 points and 5 assists with only one turnover.
Brown’s 12 assists vs. Long Beach were only one shy of his career-high
of 13 vs. Hope.
JAMAAL BROWN ON A ROLL: Jamaal Brown’s play the past four games
is probably the biggest reason for the Titans’ turnaround. After
averaging 8 points (8-for-23 FGs) in the 3-game losing streak, he’s
had 45 points (20-of-37 FGs) in the four wins with 32 rebounds. His double-double
(13 points, 14 rebounds) vs. UCSB was his fourth of the season.
DOUBLE FIGURES: With five players averaging double figures, it’s
not surprising to see the Titans spreading the scoring load around.All
five of the “current” starters have led the team in a game
-- B.Brown 9 times, Holmes (4), King (3), Harper (2), J. Brown (1) and
four times at least five players have been in double figures. Six Titans
(B. Brown 21, Asprilla 16, Harper 16, King 15, Burns 14 and Quinet 10)
did it vs. Hope International. Prior to that performance, the last time
the Titans had six players in double figures was Feb. 4, 1999, in an 88-78
home win over Utah State (Cunningham 23, Caldwell 12, Jarrett 12, Murphy
12, Fischer 11, Harmon 10).
3-BOMBS AWAY: Fullerton is averaging 8.0 makes and 22.1 attempts per game.
Those numbers project over a 27-game regular season to 216 makes and 595
attempts and both of those numbers would be school single-season records
(196 makes last season and 551 attempts in 1996-97). As goes perimeter
shooting, the results have seldom been “average.” They shot
a season’s worst 3-for-18 vs. UC Riverside on Jan. 6 and two nights
later a season’s best 10-for-18 vs. UC Davis. They went 0-for-5
in the first half and 7-for-12 in the second half vs. Long Beach State.
On the USU-Idaho road trip they made only 12 of 48 (.250) and then hit
18 of 53 (.340) at home. The 14 3-pointers vs. UCI tied the school single-game
record originally set on Dec. 9, 2003, vs. USC. The 29 attempts vs. UCSB
equalled a season high and were only two shy of the school record. The
Titans made 10 in the second half of the UCI game and 9 in the first half
at UCR on Feb. 3. At UC Davis on Monday night they were 0-for-9 in the
first half and 6-for-9 in the second half.
ABOUT TIME: Fullerton has shot more free throws than its opponent only
twice all season -- in wins vs. UC Santa Barbara and at UC Davis. The
season disparity is 410 attempts by opponents to 249 by Fullerton. But
in the 4-game winning streak, CSF is 42-of-64 compared to 38-of-55 by
opponents.
HELLO, CAMERAS: The UCI (KVMD) and Long Beach State (FOX Sports Net West
2) games will be Nos. 4 and 5 on TV for the Titans this season out of
a scheduled total of six. The first was on a local station at San Diego
State on Dec. 21. The Titans hope to add to that total with a run at the
Big West Conference post-season tournament.
SPEAKING OF CAMERAS: ABC's highly rated Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
came to Titan Gym on Dec. 8 to tape a tribute to Rodney Anderson, the
former Titan player whose family received the full treatment from the
show between Dec. 4 and 14, getting TWO new homes to replace their 1911-built
residence in South Central L.A. The taping featured the retirement of
his jersey (No. 4) and was included in a special two-hour episode that
aired on Jan. 16 and a one-hour segment on Jan. 17. Rodney was shot in
a mistaken-identity gang shooting near his home on Mar. 2, 2000, and is
paralyzed and in a wheelchair. He is scheduled to graduate in June with
a degree in human services. He and his girlfriend, Monique, were married
on Dec. 13 in their new yard as part of the show.
NUMBER SWITCH: Jamaal Brown was going to wear No. 4 this season for the
Titans in honor of his former Western Kentucky teammate Nathan Eisert,
who committed suicide. Jamaal gave up that jersey at the TV taping and
opted for No. 32, a number his dad wore.
