Box Score

SAN DIEGO - Marek Klassen scored a career-high 30 points to lead the Point Loma men's basketball team to a 91-84 win over Hawaii Pacific on Thursday, Feb. 13.

This was the fourth straight win, and fifth in its last six games, for PLNU which improved to 15-8 on the season and moved into fifth place in the PacWest standings with a 10-7 conference record. This was the third straight loss for HPU (12-9, 7-8 PacWest) and sixth in its last seven games. The Sea Warriors were 10-2 after defeating PLNU by five points on Jan. 8 but are just 2-7 since then.

Things did not look good for the Sea Lions early as HPU ran out to a 14-point lead (28-14) in the first half. The Sea Lions where able to weather the early game struggles and cut the Sea Warriors' lead to five points at halftime (37-32).

PLNU would make the proper adjustments at the intermission to come back with their best offensive half of the season. PLNU put up 59 points in the final 20 minutes while shooting 64 percent from the field and 6-of-10 from long range. The Sea Lions turned the ball over only four times in the second half and hit 25 of its 29 free throws.

The Sea Lions would score the first six points after halftime to take the lead. The teams would go back and forth for the rest of the half with neither team ever holding more than an eight-point lead. HPU cut the lead to five points on a layup by Darry Jones, Jr. with 1:44 remaining but the Sea Lions finished off the game by going 12-for-12 at the charity stripe in the final minutes to earn the win.

Lescault added 18 points and a team-leading four assists as he and Klassen combined for 48 of the Sea Lions' 91 points. Klassen also notched season-high for rebounds as he pulled in nine boards while shooting 10-of-14 from the field and 4-of-6 from behind the 3-point arc. PLNU also got 13 points and seven rebounds from Junior Morgan, and Judd Welfringer came off the bench to score 10 points as he went 8-of-10 at the free throw line.

Hawaii Pacific got 33 points from Justin Long and 22 from Leif Rodney. Long, who entered the game as the PacWest's leading scorer with 20.1 ppg, was still a prolific scorer but the Sea Lions forced him to take 26 shots to record those 33 points. HPU shot 52 percent in the first half but just 39 percent in the second half as PLNU was able to come from behind for the win.

PLNU will be at home again this Saturday when it faces BYU-Hawaii (11-11, 9-7 PacWest) at 4:00 p.m.