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Box score, play-by-play
SEATTLE -- Another game, another career-high scoring outburst for Chris Banchero.
The junior point guard pumped in 33 points -- the second straight game he has set a career scoring high -- and led the 11th-ranked Seattle Pacific men to an 80-71 victory against Alaska Anchorage in a Great Northwest Athletic Conference contest on Thursday night in Brougham Pavilion.
“My shot felt good tonight, that's about all I can really say,” said Banchero, who converted 13 of 17 shots from the field and was 3-of-5 on 3-pointers. “I've been feeling good lately. I just shot and it just kept going in, so all I could really do is smile.”
Banchero, coming off a 27-point night in last Saturday's 79-69 win against Montana State Billings, amassed the most points by a Falcon since Dustin Bremerman tallied 33 against Saint Martin's on Feb. 17, 2006. It was the best scoring output of the season for SPU, topping the 32-point performance of senior guard Brandon Larrieu in a 78-58 victory against Sonoma State on Nov. 27.
A product of Seattle's O'Dea High School, Banchero increased his team-leading scoring average to 18.8 points. He has 16 games of 20-or-more points during his career, including eight this season. But Thursday was his first time above the 30-point plateau.
Banchero didn't realize he had registered his collegiate-high scoring total. When informed after the game that his total was 33 points, Banchero tried to recall the last time he scored that many in a game at any level.
“I think I scored in the low 40s my senior year in high school.”
But this was no prep opponent. The Seawolves entered the game as the stingiest defense in the GNAC, surrendering just 61.1 points per game. Only one other team has reached the 80-point plateau against UAA and that was former SPU coach Ken Bone's Washington State squad that won 87-68 on Nov. 25 in Anchorage.
Current coach Ryan Looney, in his first year with the Falcons, appreciated Banchero's performance, but also lauded his teammates.
“When you look at the stat sheet Chris obviously gave us a huge boost. You need more points than the other team at the end of the day and he was able to help us in that way, but we had a lot of other guys that did other things too.”
Thursday's victory kept Seattle Pacific (15-2, 6-0 GNAC), ranked No. 1 in the West Region, perfect atop the conference standings. The Falcons have won their opening six GNAC games for the first time since 2005-06.
The loss dropped the Seawolves to 12-5 overall, 3-3 in the league play.
Up 33-25 at halftime, the Falcons opened the second half on a 13-2 run, with Banchero getting nine of those points. Then, he drained a 3-pointer to make it 49-29 with 15:52 remaining. Banchero scored 22 points during the second half on 8-of-9 shooting from the field.
But Anchorage stormed back, going on a 25-10 run during the next 8-½ minutes, closing to 59-54 with 7:28 still on the clock. It was still a five-point game at 65-60 with 4:09 to play, but SPU never let the Seawolves get any closer.
Junior wing Jeff Downs (Kirkland, Wash./Bellevue Christian HS) added 13 points for the Falcons, and Larrieu (Puyallup, Wash./Franklin Pierce HS) chipped in 11.
The Falcons, who are the fifth-best shooting team in all of NCAA Division II, took just 43 shots from the floor, but hit 25 of them for a 58-percent clip.
Alaska Anchorage shot 50 percent (29 of 58), which included 53-percent shooting during the second half (19 of 36) to get back into the game.
The Seawolves were led by the 22 points of Brandon Walker. Casey Robinson added 19.
MOREIRA MISSING
Thursday's victory came in the wake of some difficult news for the Falcons. They learned that 6-foot-9 senior post player Rafael Moriera (Brasilia, Brazil) will be sidelined for several weeks. He injured his knee last Friday in practice and missed Saturday's home win over MSU Billings. But at that time it was thought he would return this week.
Instead, Moreira and his 13.1-point and 5.9-rebound per-game averages will be out indefinitely.
“We are definitely all going to have to step up, all five starters,” said Banchero. “(Rafael) is huge for us. He's our true big man and it's going to be tough without him. We're going to have to pick up the pace, but as long as we play hard we'll do well.”
On Thursday, the Falcons played admirably without their biggest front-line presence.
“I'm really proud of our guys for a couple different reasons. We had to fight through some adversity this week with injuries,” Looney said. “Also, we played what statistically was the best rebounding team in our conference. In my opinion a big reason we had success tonight was because we out-rebounded UAA, which gave us a few more possessions on offense than we normally get.”
Rebounding was obviously a focus of attention this week in practice after SPU was out-boarded 38-25 by Billings on Saturday. That emphasis paid off as the Falcons grabbed 26 rebounds Thursday, one more than Anchorage.
The Seattle Pacific men face Alaska Fairbanks on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. in Brougham Pavilion, the second half of a Homecoming hoops doubleheader. The Falcon women meet their Fairbanks counterparts at 1:30 p.m.
“Anytime you have a big game and have some success, it's human nature to have a little bit of a letdown,” Looney cautioned. “It's our job as coaches to make sure that tomorrow in our preparation that we don't let that happen.”
NCAA Men's Basketball
Thursday, Jan. 28, 2010
Brougham Pavilion/Seattle, Wash.
at (#11) Seattle Pacific 80, Alaska Anchorage 71
ALASKA ANCHORAGE (12-5, 3-3 GNAC)
Walker 9-13 4-6 22; Robinson 7-10 2-2 19; White 4-6 1-1 9; White 3-8 0-0 8; Pacitti 3-10 0-0 7; Stevens 2-6 0-0 4; Lao 1-5 0-0 2; Gibcus 0-0 0-0 0; Arnott 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 29-58 7-9 71.
SEATTLE PACIFIC (15-2, 6-0 GNAC)
Banchero 13-17 4-6 33; Downs 4-9 2-3 13; Larrieu 2-5 6-7 11; Anderson 2-4 3-4 8; Campanaro 2-4 2-4 7; Wardell 1-2 2-4 4; Diederichs 1-1 0-0 2; Sweet 0-0 2-2 2; Vranes 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 25-43 21-30 80.
Alaska Anchorage.............. 25 46 - 71
Seattle Pacific.................... 33 47 - 80
3-point goals--UAA 6-15 (Robinson 3-4; White 2-4; Pacitti 1-3; Lao 0-2; Walker 0-2), SPU 9-19 (Banchero 3-5; Downs 3-7; Campanaro 1-3; Anderson 1-2; Larrieu 1-2). Fouled out--UAA-Lao, SPU-None. Rebounds--UAA 25 (Pacitti 5), SPU 26 (Downs 4; Campanaro 4; Larrieu 4; Banchero 4). Assists--UAA 11 (Walker 4; Pacitti 4), SPU 17 (Diederichs 5). Total fouls--UAA 24, SPU 12. Technical fouls--UAA-White, SPU-None. Att.-451.
