Coming off one of their worst losses of the season in a 94-79 defeat at the hands of UC Riverside, the CSUN men’s basketball team rebounded in a big way in Saturday night’s regular-season finale vs. Hawai’i.
CSUN used a second-half comeback to overtake the Rainbow Warriors 82-73 at the Premier America Credit Union Arena. It’s the first season sweep over the Bows in program history for CSUN.
“I thought it was a great team effort. We’re playing really good right now. We’ve got a lot of confidence going into Henderson and we want more,” CSUN coach Andy Newman said.
CSUN, the No. 4 seed, will return to Henderson, Nevada, for the 2025 Big West Basketball Championships next week. The Matadors earned a first-round bye and will await the winner of Wednesday’s first-round game between No. 8 Cal State Bakersfield and No. 5 UC Santa Barbara on Thursday, March 13, at 6 p.m.
Tyler Beard had his best game in a Matador uniform, finishing with a season-high 19 points, six rebounds and six assists as he did it all to help CSUN close out the win.
“The [win] is always nice. especially being senior night, where a lot of the guys were emotional including myself. [It was] a big night last game for a lot of us, but the emphasis from coach for a lot of us was to keep the main thing, the main thing and stay focused,” Beard said. “It’s a lot of basketball left, hopefully. [We] just gotta keep playing our brand of basketball.”
CSUN ran into foul trouble almost instantly to begin the game. Mahmoud Fofana and PJ Fuller II played a total of nine minutes in the first half as both players picked up three fouls, forcing Newman to turn to his bench earlier than expected.
Despite having two starters off the court for most of the half, CSUN managed to tango with Hawai’i until the Bows took a 37-30 lead with 2:16 left in the opening half.
Just as the game looked like it would slip away before halftime, the Matadors rallied and cut the deficit to one point heading into halftime.
Fuller was a man on a mission to begin the second half. In the first minute of the half, he hit back-to-back three-pointers to give CSUN the lead, but the Matadors never looked back.
“It felt good to be out there doing what I love. I don’t really like sitting on the bench. Of course I want to be out there helping my team,” Fuller said. “But when I did get into foul trouble I had no doubt that whoever was on the court was gonna pick up my slack.”
The senior guard ended his night with 16 points, shooting 6-12 from the field, including 3-4 from behind the arc.
“We’re a deep team. We got a lot of really good players on this team and when you win 22 games, it’s cause you got a deep bench,” Newman added.
CSUN’s lead rose to as high as 14 points in the second half, and they were in cruise control for the game’s final ten minutes.
The Matadors ended the regular season with a 22-9 record and tied the school record for wins in a season, which was last accomplished by the 2000-01 team.
