Pacific men’s hoops blown out

Kessler Edwards scored a career-high 37 points, including 18 in the first half, to lead the Pepperdine Waves to an 85-68 victory over the Pacific Tigers in a West Coast Conference men’s basketball game on Thursday at Firestone Fieldhouse in Malibu.

The loss snapped the Tigers’ (5-2, 2-1 WCC) four-game winning streak and was only their second loss in their previous nine matchups against the Waves (6-6, 2-1). Pacific plays No. 1 Gonzaga (14-0, 5-0) at 7 p.m. on Saturday in Spokane, Wash.

Pacific never was in the game and had no answer for Edwards, who also grabbed 11 rebounds and surpassed 1,000 points in his career. His free throw with 10:23 remaining in the game gave Pepperdine its largest lead at 70-36 before coach Lorenzo Romar emptied the bench. Colbey Ross was held to seven points, nine points below his season average, but had 11 assists.

Pierre Crockrell III scored a career-high 19 points on 7-of-8 shooting from the floor, and Jahbril Price-Noel scored 15 points to lead the Tigers.

Jordan Bell made a 3-pointer to open the scoring, but from there Pacific made just 2 of its next 13 field-goal attempts, turned over the ball with alarming regularity and trailed by as many as 26 points, 36-10, with 3:52 left in the first half. The Tigers didn’t reach double figures until the 5:54 mark on a free throw by Price-Noel and were down 44-20 at the intermission.

Edwards made 5 of 10 from the field, including 3 of 4 from 3-point range, and grabbed six rebounds in the first 20 minutes. Pacific committed 12 turnovers in the first half, their total average per game this season, and amassed 20 in the game.

The Tigers went 6 of 20 (30%) from the floor, including 3 of 11 (27.4%) from 3-point range in the first half, while the Waves made 16 of 34 (47.1%) from the floor, including 7 of 13 (53.8%) from 3point range.