CS Dominguez Hills Loses Its Chance to Make Playoffs

Cal State Dominguez Hills basketball Coach Dave Yanai said he didn’t want his team to “back into” the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. postseason tournament after a 68-55 loss to Cal State Bakersfield Friday night.

Yanai got his wish. But for a while Saturday night, it appeared the Toros still had a chance to advance as Yanai watched UC Riverside soundly defeat Cal State Los Angeles, 88-57.

An L.A. loss, coupled with a victory by San Luis Obispo over Cal Poly Pomona would have precipitated a coin toss to decide whether L.A. or idle Dominguez Hills would advance to the tournament.

When the word came that Pomona had won, 107-97, Yanai took the news gracefully.

“We had our opportunity to get in Friday night against Bakersfield,” he said. “We played hard and it was a good game.”

Bakersfield, which defeated Chapman College, 77-58, Saturday, shared the CCAA title with Riverside with a 9-3 conference record, but will play host to the postseason tournament next weekend because it defeated Riverside twice in regular-season play. Pomona and San Luis Obispo finished tied for third at 6-6.

Dominguez Hills and Cal State LA finished in a tie for fifth place at 5-7.

In Friday’s loss to Bakersfield, the teams combined to score only 24 points in the first 15 minutes. Bakersfield’s Greg McCall made a three-point shot to break a 14-14 tie with 3:55 left in the first half and Bakersfield extended its lead to 24-20 on McCall’s field goal with eight seconds remaining.

Dominguez Hills clawed back and retained the lead, 32-31, with 13:47 to go on two free throws by Moore. After a Bakersfield basket by Russell Jarvis, the Toros regained the lead on a jump shot by John Brown, who would figure prominently in the Toros’ undoing minutes later.

Dominguez Hills held its last lead, 41-40, with eight minutes left on a whirling layup by freshman center Albert Kiilehua.

But McCall followed with another three-point shot to make the score 43-41.

Bakersfield went on to extend its lead to 11 points, thanks in part to a controversial incident involving Brown.

With Bakersfield leading, 45-43, with 5:45 left, Brown was cited for a technical foul after he appeared to throw an elbow at Kenny Warren of Bakersfield after Warren had been fouled by Shelton Hill. Warren made three of four free throws to increase the lead to 48-43. Before Dominguez Hills could recover it trailed, 56-45.

The usually respectful and reserved Yanai was still fuming about the call against Brown after the game ended, calling it “a critical call” that should not have been made “in a game as important as this.”

“We wanted to put our best defensive unit on the floor, because we knew we couldn’t run with Bakersfield. We wanted to keep the game close and have a chance to win the game. That scenario was a very real possibility until that critical technical foul against John Brown.”

However, Yanai was philosophical about the season.

“I wanted to win that game and go into the playoffs because we won, not because we lost,” he said. “I don’t want to back into the playoffs with a loss.”