NEWPORT NEWS, Va. – The UC Santa Cruz men's basketball team fell to No. 14 Christopher Newport University on Saturday afternoon.
Joseph Espy turned in a double double with 17 points and 12 rebounds on the afternoon. The Slugs shot 34.3% from the field but struggled from downtown, shooting just 13.0% with three three-pointers made on the day. UC Santa Cruz will be back in action tomorrow at 9:00 a.m. Pacific Time when they take on the University of Mary Washington.
How It Happened
The Banana Slugs struggled in the first half as they shot 30.0% from beyond the arc and 37.0% from the field while CNU shot 44.8% from the field and connected on 5-8 threes (62.5%).
UC Santa Cruz got off to a slow start as Christopher Newport started the day on an 8-0 run before
Zino Okah got the Slugs on board with a midrange jumper. From there, the Captains extended their lead to 20-6 with a 12-4 with
Joseph Espy and
Andrew Ferrara-Jones both scoring for UCSC. Despite the early CNU advantage, the Banana Slugs got to work, using a 16-7 run to storm back into the contest, cutting the CNU lead to 27-22 with 5:45 remaining in the half. The run was led by Ferrara-Jones with seven points with
Ian McCloskey (4pts),
Miles Burrows (3pts), and
Joseph Espy (2pts) all chiming in as well. The final five minutes of the half saw CNU outscore UCSC 11-6 to take a 38-28 lead into the halftime break.
The Slugs struck first in the second half with a layup from
Joseph Espy to spark their comeback attempt. The two points from Espy were the start of a 20-12 run from UCSC with Espy leading the charge with eight hard fought points in the run while
Ian McCloskey and
Ryan Wilson both scored four with
Zino Okah and
Caden Breznikar adding in two each. The surge cut the lead to 50-48, forcing the Captains to call a timeout with 10:59 left in the half.
Out of the break, the Captains hit a three and didn't look back as they went on a 22-6 run to go up 72-54 with 2:45 left in the contest. CNU narrowly outscored UCSC 4-3 down the stretch to cap off the 76-57 victory over the Slugs.
