SEA LIONS DEFINING THE MISSION AHEAD OF 2025-26 SEASON

(SAN DIEGO) PLNU Men’s Basketball will open the 2025-26 season with its best-ever national preseason ranking, entering the year ranked No. 7 in the NABC Preseason Coaches Poll.

While the foundation has been laid for Point Loma, coming off two West Regional championship game appearances in the last three seasons, the Sea Lions are redefining who they want to be this year. 

“One thing that we’re really passionate about is letting our guys define the mission,” Head Coach Justin Downer said. “We’ve really challenged them that, ‘It’s no longer you guys living up to the standards of the former players and the former teams. They’ve laid the foundation for you, and now it’s your turn to define what this program is. It’s your program.’

“That really took a weight off some of the new guys’ shoulders, not having to live up to the reputation of the 2025 team, the 2023 team, the 2019 team. This is our team, the ’26 team. We’re defining it and we appreciate everybody’s shoulders we’re standing on.”

While PLNU Men’s Basketball program has had unquestioned on-court success in recent years, Point Loma’s focus goes beyond just wins and losses.

“Everybody that we’ve brought in is attracted to winning,” Downer said. “I think that’s where it starts, but we don’t really talk about winning, we don’t talk about championships, we don’t talk about the trophies. We talk about a standard of excellence.”

That standard of excellence is centered on developing student-athletes within the program, both on and off the court.

“We want to develop them obviously on the floor, but we want to develop them academically, personally and spiritually as well,” Downer said. “Our process is that our staff is actually so focused on your development, that you actually don’t have to focus on it. You just have to show up, work hard and have a good attitude.

“We’re going to make sure that you’re the best player you can be, and the chips will fall how they may. I think that’s a great way to build trust with your roster because they know we’re in it for them, so they can be in it for their teammates and for us.”

The program’s focus on development is also seen in the fostering of a brotherhood among the players.

“What made last year’s group so cool was it was such a brotherhood, and they had so much fun playing together,” Downer said. “They played with so much joy, passion, togetherness and selflessness. What we found in this year’s recruiting cycle was people were attracted to that as much as they were the winning. We want to build on that, but also make sure that’s part of what we do and we’re not just adding talent just to get talent.

“Everybody in the recruiting cycle was able to identify to us that it’s less about, ‘Hey I want to go there because I want to score points in a Point Loma jersey’ and more about, ‘I want to be a part of what Point Loma’s doing.’ That’s the feedback that we got and if that’s the focal point of what we’re doing, then I think we’ll continue to have more success.”

ROSTER

Point Loma’s roster this year features 18 players, the biggest roster Downer has had entering his third year at the helm of the Sea Lions.

“My first year I wanted to make sure we didn’t have a big roster because I wanted the locker room to be really tight,” Downer said. “I wanted to establish, ‘This is what our culture is, this is how we go about it and let it grow from there.’ While the roster has grown, we haven’t changed how we bring people in and what the standards are when we bring people in. People want to be a part of what we value.”

Of the 18 players, only one is a senior for a program that has had a 100% undergraduate retention rate during Downer’s tenure.

“When we're in the portal looking for guys, we can certainly do a lot with guys with one year, but our biggest jumps that you've seen is guys improve a lot really fast, but then that second year they make that huge jump,” Downer said. “You think of a Zack Paulsen, Coby Barnes, what you're going to see from Jaden Matingou this year. We're trying to get guys who want to finish their careers here and I think we have that with this year's group.”

RETURNERS

Tyce Paulsen, the 2023-24 PacWest Freshman of the Year and an All-Conference Third Team selection a season ago, leads Point Loma’s returners after averaging 10.4 points per game last year.

“Tyce comes in with high expectations being the only underclassmen to start on last year's team, playing with his big brother,” Downer said. “He wants to fill that leadership role and he wants to do right by the foundation that his brother and his teammates laid.

“He’s putting in the work, and he's put on some weight which is awesome. You’ll see more of his ball skills this year that maybe he didn't have to use in the past, so I’m excited for him.”

Jaden Matingou averaged 5.0 ppg and ranked second on the team in assists a season ago.

“I think the most improved player in our program since I've been here is Jaden,” Downer said. “He’s played behind some really good guards, Jake Lifgren his first year and Coby Barnes and Luke Haupt last year. He’s shown a ton of growth as a player and as a leader. I think he's going to step in and really surprise some people with his ability.”

Andrew Hommes played in all 35 games last season, averaging 5.3 ppg. 

“This is the first offseason he's had,” Downer said. “He missed the last two offseasons with injury, so the growth that he's had being able to just show up in the gym every single day has been great. He's been a great voice for us. He has a ton of pride for Point Loma, with his family having such tradition here. This place means something to him, and it's shown this offseason.”

Jake Lifgren has not played for Point Loma since December 2023 after a pair of season-ending injuries but is expected to make an impact in his return to the court. He led PLNU with 18.1 ppg in 14 games played in 2023-24.

“Jake's going to have not played in almost 700 days by the time he plays his first game to start the year,” Downer said. “The leader that he's been, I've never seen someone handle adversity with more grace and more passion.

“We expect him to come in and be a really good player as well. When you have not only experience, but you have guys that have handled adversity well, the new guys come in and they understand what the standard of excellence is pretty quickly.”

NEWCOMERS

Point Loma welcomes five talented transfers to the fold this year, along with seven freshmen. 

“I love the additions that we have,” Downer said. “You get two double-digit scoring, Division II transfers in Caden Harris and James Nobles who’ve done it at our level and have been very productive. They fit in seamlessly.

“Our frontcourt is filled with Division I size and guys who have played significant minutes at that level. The biggest hole we had in last year’s group was losing our frontcourt, so to be able to add Andrew Nagy and Jack Wistrcill in our frontcourt is going to help us a ton.

“We have a lot of depth with Jude Harris, along with attracting some high-level freshmen as well.”

Harris (Chico State) and Nobles (Sonoma State) were both All-CCAA performers last season.

“When you lose three All-Conference players like Coby Barnes, Zack Paulsen and Luke Haupt, who are really strong, big, physical guards, it's really important to replace them. Both James and Kaden can score at all three levels and have shot the 3 well in their careers. They both get to the rim really well, so adding those two guys was really important for us in in replacing those three.”

PLNU also added three NCAA Division I transfers in Jack Wistrcill (Northern Arizona), Andrew Nagy (Long Beach State) and Jude Harris (Portland).

“We really wanted to add shooting and passing to our frontcourt,” Downer said. “We’ve had a ton of athleticism and size up there in the in the recent years, but sometimes we've lacked the ability to stretch the floor and pass the ball in the frontcourt, so adding Jack and Nagy has really helped that.

“We added more size on the wing in Jude Harris, who’s 6-6 and his best skill is shooting. We’ve bolstered our size, shooting and basketball IQ, and you can't have enough of that.”

Downer is also excited for the additions in his freshmen class.

“We also wanted to add talented freshmen and I think it's been no secret that the best players at Point Loma over the past five years have been high school kids,” Downer said. “You saw Kaden Anderson, Luke Haupt and Jake Lifgren. We have guys coming back like Jaden Matingou, Andrew Hommes, Luke Smith and Tyce Paulsen. Those guys are projected to be some of our best players.”

Downer specifically highlighted freshmen Judson Loe and Demari Davis as players expected to make an immediate impact.

“They’re going to fight for minutes and they're going to play right away,” Downer said. “Being able to add two more guys in the 2025 class that can be cornerstones of our program over the next four years, that was really important.

“We’ve had some talented freshmen, with Tyce Paulsen and Luke Smith finishing first place and runner up to each other in PacWest Freshman of the Year voting, so that's really a high bar but Judson's come in and has been just as impressive as either of those guys were as freshmen. It’s a different roster to try and get time on than the roster those guys were on, but he's been really impressive and has impressed a lot of his teammates.

“Demari Davis is as talented as any high school kid we've got. He was recruited at a really high level in high school. He had some injuries and is still getting healthy, but he'll make a significant impact on the floor as well.”

SCHEDULE

After a home exhibition against Westcliff on Saturday, Point Loma will open its regular season at the PacWest/CCAA Conference Challenge in Costa Mesa with matchups against Cal State Dominguez Hills (Nov. 14) and Cal State San Bernardino (Nov. 15) in a rematch of last year’s regional championship and regional semifinal games.

PLNU will return home to Golden Gym for a pair of games against Cal State San Marcos (Nov. 19) and Stanton (Nov. 22) before closing out its non-conference schedule at the SPU Thanksgiving Classic, where the Sea Lions will play Central Washington (Nov. 28) and Seattle Pacific (Nov. 29).

Four of Point Loma’s six non-conference matchups are against teams who competed in last year’s NCAA West Regional, including all three teams the Sea Lions faced in their run to the regional championship game.

“We try to build the best non-conference schedule in the country every year,” Downer said. “The national tournament committee has told us that that's what they're going to value when they make decisions down the stretch, so we don't shy away from it. Hopefully that pays off on the backend, but from there we're going to take it one game at a time.

“It just becomes about preparing for each team individually and trusting that if we do our job and perform well, then we’ll be rewarded in March.”

Point Loma, winners of the PacWest for four straight seasons, was picked once again to finish atop the conference this year as the No. 1 team in the PacWest Preseason Poll.

The Sea Lions will begin conference play on Dec. 4 at Jessup in search of a fifth-consecutive PacWest title.

“I think what’s fun about this year’s group is that they haven’t really been a part of it yet, so for them they’re trying to win their first, not their fifth,” Downer said. “For the returners, this will be the first one where they weren’t necessarily role players in. I think there’s a ton of pride and a ton of energy in that.”

As winners of last season’s conference crown, Point Loma will host the six-team PacWest Championships (March 5-7).

The NCAA West Regional, which PLNU has hosted twice in the past three seasons as the No. 1 seed, will take place March 13-16.

The winner of each region will then advance to the Elite Eight to compete for a national championship, which will be decided on April 4 in Indianapolis.

For the team’s full schedule, click HERE.