{"id":46764,"date":"2015-02-21T22:30:57","date_gmt":"2015-02-22T05:30:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=46764"},"modified":"2015-02-22T01:21:42","modified_gmt":"2015-02-22T08:21:42","slug":"azusa-pacific-vs-cal-baptist-730-pm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=46764","title":{"rendered":"No Place Like Home For Cougars"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Troy<\/a>

Troy Leaf lights up the CBU Lancers.<\/p><\/div>\n

By Tim Peterson<\/p>\n

(Glendora) – Azusa Pacific turned the tables on Cal Baptist Saturday night.\u00a0Two weeks ago the Lancers beat APU\u00a087-80 before a raucous home crowd, but this time\u00a0it was the Cougars\u00a0who used a standing room only crowd to propel them to an\u00a084-68 victory and to the cusp of a PacWest Conference title.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We love playing here and we love our fans.\u00a0I played here and this is just a great school. The support\u00a0tonight was just tremendous,” said Azusa Pacific Coach Justin Leslie.<\/p>\n

Troy Leaf did the bulk of the damage offensively scoring 29 points but Will Ward with 13 and Christian Katuala with 10 also played a big part.<\/p>\n

\"Will<\/a>

Will Ward slams home two in the win over Cal Baptist.<\/p><\/div>\n

“Christian and Will both scoring in double digits was huge,” Leslie said. “That’s what we need to do against Cal Baptist to beat them- score points in the paint.”<\/p>\n

It was Cal Baptist that actually got off to the fast start. The Lancers raced out to a 9-2 lead but that turned out to be\u00a0their largest lead of the contest. APU caught and passed\u00a0CBU with\u00a0just over six minutes\u00a0gone in the \u00a0first half and never trailed again. Behind Leaf’s\u00a014 points the Cougars opened up an 11 point lead at the half, 38-27. After a hot start\u00a0the Lancers\u00a0cooled off and finished the half shooting just 38 percent from the field including 3 of 14 from three point land.<\/p>\n

Leaf continued his hot shooting knocking down a pair of threes to open the second half as the Cougars built a\u00a044-31 lead. Cal Baptist tried to keep pace\u00a0as Gelaun Wheelwright nailed\u00a0a three pointer but Azusa Pacific\u00a0kept hitting big shots to keep them at bay.<\/p>\n

Lydell Cardwell splashed home a three from the corner\u00a0to give the Cougs a 58-44 advantage. Later in the half Kevin Stafford hit consecutive three point bombs to give Azusa Pacific a 17 point advantage with 7:15 left that completely took the wind out of the CBU sails. Ironically it was the only points Stafford scored in the game as he finished with six.<\/p>\n

“Those two threes that\u00a0Kevin Stafford hit were real big shots. Just huge,”\u00a0Leslie said.<\/p>\n

From there\u00a0the Cougars cruised home eventually extending the lead to 24 with 2:45 left before finishing with the 16 point victory.<\/p>\n

Leslie talked about the difference between\u00a0the two games. “Tonight we defended and guarded.\u00a0I felt that last time we just gave them too many opportunities,”\u00a0Leslie said. “We just have a really good team and next Saturday we play for a conference title.<\/p>\n

Wheelwright\u00a0led Cal Baptist with 21 and Michael Smith\u00a0finished with 10. APU outrebounded CBU 34-31.<\/p>\n

The Cougars, now 16-3 in conference, can wrap it up next Saturday with a win over Fresno Pacific. They are\u00a023-4 overall. The Lancers are 20-5 on the season,\u00a014-4 in the PacWest.<\/p>\n

CBU\u00a0 27\u00a0 41\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a068<\/p>\n

APU\u00a0 38\u00a0 46\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 84<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Tim Peterson (Glendora) – Azusa Pacific turned the tables on Cal Baptist Saturday night.\u00a0Two weeks ago the Lancers beat APU\u00a087-80 before a raucous home crowd, but this time\u00a0it was the Cougars\u00a0who used a standing room only crowd to propel them to an\u00a084-68 victory and to the cusp of a PacWest Conference title.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[871],"tags":[8824,10929,8828,8846,10962,10930,10961,10829,10827,10932,10957,8830,10830],"class_list":["post-46764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-college","tag-azusa-pacific-basketball","tag-cal-baptist-basketball","tag-christian-katuala","tag-felix-event-center","tag-fresno-pacific-basketball","tag-gelaun-wheelwright","tag-justin-leslie","tag-kevin-stafford","tag-lydell-cardwell","tag-michael-smith","tag-pacwest-conference","tag-troy-leaf","tag-will-ward"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46764"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46790,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46764\/revisions\/46790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}