{"id":47048,"date":"2015-03-13T19:31:08","date_gmt":"2015-03-14T02:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=47048"},"modified":"2015-03-14T11:18:48","modified_gmt":"2015-03-14T18:18:48","slug":"azusa-pacific-vs-western-oregon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/?p=47048","title":{"rendered":"Cougars Start Slow, Advance Fast, 75-67"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Troy<\/a>

Troy Leaf glides in for two of his 36 in the win over Western Oregon.<\/p><\/div>\n

By Tim Peterson<\/p>\n

(Azusa) – Azusa Pacific started slow, got even at half and then finished fast in a 75-67 win over Western Oregon in the first round of the Division 2 playoffs. The NCAA playoff win was the first in\u00a0school history.<\/p>\n

“The bottom line is it wasn’t pretty,’ said Cougar head coach Justin Leslie.\u00a0“But whether we win by one point or 20 points, I don’t care. We’re moving on.”<\/p>\n

\"Robert<\/a>

Robert Sandoval with a couple of key baskets in the Cougar win.<\/p><\/div>\n

Troy Leaf led the way for the Cougars with 36 points.\u00a0Leaf had 21 in the second half and was 10- 18 from the field overall and hit three\u00a0from beyond the arc.\u00a0Leaf was 13-13 from the free throw line.\u00a0Robert\u00a0Sandoval was the only other Cougar in double figures with 11.<\/p>\n

It was a struggle early for APU\u00a0falling behind\u00a011-3 out of the chute.\u00a0The Cougars didn’t score for the first four and a half minutes of the game. Azusa Pacific eventually caught\u00a0the Bulls at 15 and got its first lead\u00a0at 18-15 on a Leaf three.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would hope that’s not our MO,\u201d said Leaf of the slow start. \u201cI know we started the last game slow and this one slow but that’s something we’ll\u00a0have\u00a0to figure out. But I think for the most part we’ve done a pretty good job of coming out and ready to play.\u00a0But we’re not going to give up\u00a0if\u00a0shots aren’t falling or things aren’t going our way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The teams went into the break tied at 34.<\/p>\n

Leaf and his teammates certainly figured it out in the second half.<\/p>\n

Still tied at 49, the Cougars went on a 12-0 run that proved to be the knockout blow. Leaf’s three capped the blitz and Stafford also hit a big trey.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely that was big,\u201d Leslie said. Anytime you can get a 12 point lead late in the game, as a coach, it starts making things pretty easy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Western Oregon continued to hang around however cutting the lead to four with 39 seconds left on an Andy Avgi three. Avgi led the Bulls with 19 points and also pulled down eight rebounds. Julian Nichols had 14 and Thomas Lewis scored 10.<\/p>\n

\u201cAvgi is just a tough cover,\u201d Leslie said. \u201cYou have to give Western Oregon credit. They hit five of eight well contested threes down the stretch to stay in it.<\/p>\n

APU held the Bulls at bay by knocking down 17 of 18 free throws overall.<\/p>\n

Western Oregon finished 23-7 overall. Azusa Pacific improves to 25-5 and now moves on to the second round. Next up for the Cougars is a Saturday night date with Cal Poly Pomona, a 62-60 winner over Dixie State.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn’t learn anything new about our team tonight. We won’t change anything now. We earned that home court advantage. We just need to play like we can play,\u201d Leslie added.<\/p>\n

News and Notes: <\/b>APU shot 43 percent from the field for the game, 35 percent in the first half. The Cougars were 94 percent from the free throw line. Western Oregon shot 39 percent and 70 percent from the line. <\/span><\/p>\n

Western Oregon’s largest lead was 11 with 15:45 left in the first half while APU’s was 13 with 2:29 left in the game. There were 11 lead changes in the game. <\/span><\/p>\n

APU outrebounded Western Oregon 43-36, Andy Jones and Robert Sandoval each had six. <\/span><\/p>\n

Azusa Pacific will host Cal Poly Pomona Saturday night at 7:30. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Tim Peterson (Azusa) – Azusa Pacific started slow, got even at half and then finished fast in a 75-67 win over Western Oregon in the first round of the Division 2 playoffs. The NCAA playoff win was the first in\u00a0school history.<\/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":[11037,10828,8824,8846,2153,10961,10827,10826,11038,8830,11036],"class_list":["post-47048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-college","tag-andy-avgi","tag-andy-jones","tag-azusa-pacific-basketball","tag-felix-event-center","tag-julian-nichols","tag-justin-leslie","tag-lydell-cardwell","tag-robert-sandoval","tag-thomas-lewis","tag-troy-leaf","tag-western-oregon-basketball"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47048","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=47048"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47048\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47069,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47048\/revisions\/47069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=47048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=47048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/midvalleysports.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=47048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}