Portland @ Pepperdine, Thursday 2/18, 5pm

Pilots basketball: Second place (and No. 2 seed) still within reach with four WCC games left

By Jim Beseda, The Oregonian
February 17, 2010, 7:15PM

University of Portland coach Eric Reveno is struggling to come up with things to say that his Pilots haven't already heard.

But sounding like a broken record has worked, because the Pilots have won seven of their last eight games heading into tonight's West Coast Conference game against the slumping Pepperdine Waves in Malibu, Calif.

"Now it's about trying to fine tune," Reveno said. "The fun part of the riddle is figuring out things can you still do better. There's always little things that you try to tweak, and if you're watching tape, maybe you see something that you can help a player with."

With four conference games remaining, the Pilots (16-8, 7-3 WCC) have almost no chance of catching Gonzaga for first place. But assuming the Bulldogs stay the course and if UP were to win out, the Pilots could finish alone in second or at worse end up tied with Saint Mary's.

The only problem with finishing in a second-place tie with Saint Mary's is that the Gaels have a higher ranking than Portland in the NCAA's Ratings Percentage Index, so the Gaels would earn the No. 2 seed into the WCC Tournament, and the Pilots would draw the No. 3 seed.

The difference in seeds is significant, because the No. 3 seed opens tournament play in the quarterfinals, while the top two seeds earn automatic berths into the semifinals.

"In terms of the conference race, we can only control what we do," Reveno said. "If someone else trips up or something changes, so bet it. But we don't want to be the one tripping up or giving a game away that we shouldn't."

The Pilots have cut back on the time they're spending in the weight room and their practices have gotten a bit shorter, but other than that, it has been business as usual.

"We're tapering back a bit, but when they're on the court, I still want them to be in the habit of playing really hard," Reveno said. "We'll have walk-throughs, and those will be walk-throughs. But when we're practicing, we'll go at a certain pace. I think you need that to still stay sharp."

The Pilots are favored to win not only tonight's game against Pepperdine (7-19, 3-7), but also Saturday's final regular-season road game against Loyola Marymount (13-13, 4-6).

After opening conference play with three consecutive wins, the Waves have lost seven in a row, including an 80-64 loss to the Pilots four weeks ago.

"This group has worked hard and taken pride in being good," Reveno said. "I don't think we as a team have an arrogance about us that we'd overlook anybody. I sure hope not."

-- Jim Beseda

Portland 83, Pepperdine 62: Jared Stohl, T.J. Campbell lead Pilots
By The Oregonian
February 18, 2010, 11:01PM
MALIBU, Calif. -- As eager as the Portland men's basketball team is to get Nik Raivio back from an Achilles tendon injury that has kept him out of the lineup for the past month, the Pilots can't complain about the opportunity it's provided to find other ways to win.

Jared Stohl and T.J. Campbell led the latest triumph in which four Portland players scored in double figures, as the Pilots pulled away in the second half for an 83-62 victory over Pepperdine on Thursday in a West Coast Conference game at Firestone Fieldhouse.

"Everyone's doing different things and contributing," Pilots coach Eric Reveno said. "It was a real workmanlike offense. That's probably what pleased me the most, the way everyone got involved."

Stohl, Raivio's replacement in the starting lineup, matched Campbell with a team-high 18 points. Stohl sank six of Portland's 13 three-pointers.

Robin Smeulders added 13 points for the Pilots. Nemanja Mitrovic contributed a season-high 10 points off the bench.

Portland (17-8, 8-3 WCC) led 35-30 at halftime. A series of three-pointers by Stohl combined with a solid defense helped the lead grow to more than 20 by the middle of the second half.

"We really stepped up the defense in the second half," Stohl said. "We kind of closed off those lanes they'd been finding in the first half, and the offense flowed from the defense."

Reveno agreed.

"It's simple," he said. "We stopped them from making shots and started making ours.

"Defensively we had some lapses in the first half."

Portland had used three three-pointers by Campbell to take the biggest lead of the first half at 15-7, but Pepperdine responded with a series of three-pointers. The Waves (7-20, 3-8 ) took their first lead, 21-20, with 8:23 left after back-to-back three-pointers by Jonathan Dupre and Mychel Thompson.

The Pilots tied the score on a three-pointer by Stohl, ending a 10-2 Pepperdine run. Portland regained the lead for good with a three-pointer by Ethan Niedermeyer.

Pepperdine's Keion Bell scored a game-high 23 points. Darby Taylor was the Waves' next leading scorer with 11. The loss was Pepperdine's eighth in a row.

-- Heather Gripp