All-Around Effort Dominates Long Beach City in Huskies' Home Opener

by Cerwin D Haynes

Despite a tough, last second double-overtime loss on Saturday down at San Diego City, East Los Angeles College men's basketball did not have much time to dwell on that as they welcomed Long Beach City College this afternoon to a rare matinee home-opener. ELAC showed they were able to quickly shake off their weekend setback by taking full control of LBCC, soundly beating the Vikings 80-56. Sophomore F Terrence Hampton led a balanced Pack attack with his second-straight double-double performance, scoring 18 points (6-11 FGs, 1-1 3FGs, 5-6 FTs) while snagging 12 rebounds. 

The Huskies spent the first 10+ minutes of the game methodically building their lead, with sophomore G Landon Winston's dunk giving ELAC a 23-9 advantage at the 9:14 mark of the first half. The Vikings were able to slash into the lead some; Zakai Hunter's layup brought the Vikings within six at 28-22 with 2:57 left in the first half. But the Huskies closed the half with a 7-2 push, with freshman wing  Teiahjio "Ti" Gilpen's layup ultimately sending the Pack into the locker room up 35-24 at the half.

The home Green kept up the attack in the second half, not letting Long Beach entertain any ideas of a comeback. ELAC would take their first 20+ point lead at 12:26 to go on a pair of freshman F Adrionne Marcus free throws. East LA head coach John Mosley threw waves of Husky reserves at Long Beach as they saw their grow to as many as 25 points while the Vikings got no closer than 18 points the rest of the way.

HUSKY BITS

• Sophomore PG Jayden Barnes, who had 24 points at San Diego City on Saturday, did not need to dip much in his scoring bag this afternoon as he only played 16 minutes.
• Marcus and sophomore G Isaiah Hill came off the bench to score 10 and 13 points respectively. 
• ELAC dominated the boards, outrebounding LBCC by 63-28. Marcus had eight or East's whopping 29 offensive rebounds (starting wing Imani Herring had five).
• Freshman PG Darrell Morris struggled with his shot (1-8 FGs, seven points) but impressively filled up the stat sheet in all other areas. He had 11 rebounds, five assists two steals and two blocks.
• ELAC held Long Beach to 30% shooting of the afternoon, with the Vikings clanging on 18 out of their 22 tries from deep (18.2% 3FG).

UP NEXT:

The Pack will get in some good practice time before they head out to San Bernardino in nine days for the annual Alvin Hunter Classic at SBVC.