Santa Clara Overcomes Pepperdine

SANTA CLARA —  Both Pepperdine and Santa Clara were without their starting point guards Friday night, and without their direction, both teams struggled.

But the Broncos, playing their usual physical game, eventually won the struggle, 66-57, before 4,912 at Toso Pavilion.

Santa Clara raised its West Coast Athletic Conference record to 6-1 and its overall mark to 15-5. Pepperdine is 13-7 and 5-2.

Levy Middlebrooks kept the Waves in the game for the first half, scoring 14 of his game-high 26 points in the first 20 minutes.

But while Middlebrooks was making 13 of 19 shots and grabbing a team-high 11 rebounds, Tom Lewis, the Waves’ leading scorer, was held to 6 points on 2-of-11 shooting and was 0 for 4 from the field in the first half. Going into the game, Lewis was averaging 22.7 points a game.

Pepperdine hit just 42.6% of its shots (23 of 54), and the Broncos shot 46.9% (23 of 49).

Santa Clara led, 31-30, at halftime, and neither team could build an advantage until the final 11 minutes of the game. With the Waves trailing, 47-45, with 10:29 remaining, Santa Clara capitalized on a couple of Pepperdine turnovers and scored 8 straight points to build its lead to 55-45.

A basket by Donny Moore cut the deficit to 56-49 at the 4:22 mark, but that was as close as Pepperdine could get.

Pepperdine Coach Jim Harrick said it seemed to him that the Broncos “got every loose ball and got their hands over everything in sight.”

Harrick said that Santa Clara has “played that way for years, but I couldn’t tell my guys that.”

Harrick said that sophomore forward Lewis, who has had to play some at guard because point guard Marty Wilson has been lost for the season after knee surgery, is still getting used to the new position.

“It’s like a new team getting started,” he said, but added, “Lewis always comes back.”

Santa Clara has also lost its point guard, senior Chris Lane, for the season. Lane tore the Achilles’ tendon in his right heel last week in a victory over the University of San Francisco.

But in Lane’s absence, sophomore off-guard Osei Appiah from Long Beach Poly High School and junior forward-guard Mitch Burley came to the fore. Appiah led the Broncos with 20 points on 9-of-13 shooting, and Burley had 15 points.