Matadors hang on
Arizona Western finishes game strong to avoid upset loss against Cougars
Arizona Western 94 South Mountain 84 AWC: 19-7 overall, 13-5 ACCAC SM: 10-16 overall, 5-13 ACCAC
The South Mountain men’s basketball team may have entered Wednesday night’s game at Arizona Western in second-to-lastplace in the Arizona Community College Athletic Conference standings, but for 38-plus minutes, the Cougars played like a team capable of pulling off an upset.
Fortunately for AWC, that didn’t last the full 40 minutes.
Arizona Western held on for a 94-84 victory to improve to 19-7 overall and 13-5 ACCAC. It was the Matadors’ third win in a row, and they got it by finishing the game on a 9-2 run over the final 2:01.
“Sloppy at times, but we found a way to win,” AWC coach Charles Harral said. “South Mountain was really needing that win to kind of stay in the playoff hunt on the Division II side, so I thought they gave a lot of effort and they’re wellcoached.”
South Mountain (1016 overall, 5-13 ACCAC), which trailed 46-33 at the half, cut AWC’s lead to three points on four separate occasions in the final six minutes. The last of those times came with 2:17 remaining at 85-82.
After AWC forward Abderrahmane Hailouf split a pair at the line to make it 86-82, South Mountain’s Saikou Gueye missed two free throws, and then guard Alfonso Plummer connected on a corner trey to give the Matadors an 89-82 lead.
“He made big shots,” Harral said of Plummer, who was AWC’s leading scorer with 19 points on 7 of 12 shooting (5-for-7 from 3).
Forward Marvin Mapaga (18 points, 6 rebounds), guard Cash Williams (16 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists), Hailouf (14 points, 4 rebounds) and guard Bryson Langdon (14 points, 5 assists) also all finished in double figures for the Matadors, who shot 58.9 percent from the field (33-for-56) and 62.5 percent from deep (10-for-16).
“(South Mountain) had a pretty good plan,” Harral said. “They did a good job of kind of keeping Cash and Bryson under control; made our big guys make plays, which fortunately Marvin and (Hailouf) made some big plays.”
Mapaga (8-for-10) and Hailouf (6-for-8) combined to make 14 of 18 shots from the floor.
South Mountain was efficient from the floor as well at 54.5 percent (30-for-55), but was unable to match the Matadors’ success from beyond the arc. The Cougars shot just 3-for-14 from long range, including 0-for3 in the final minute, during which AWC went 5-for-6 from the free throw line to put the game away.
The Matadors blew out the Cougars, 93-67, when the teams first met back on Jan. 5 in Phoenix, but Harral acknowledged that South Mountain played a “way better game” this time around.
“All things considered, when you win it’s hard to feel too bad because there’s so many games,” Harral said. “But we could be better.”
The Matadors have four regular-season games remaining: Saturday at Phoenix, next Wednesday vs. Glendale, next Saturday vs. Eastern Arizona and Feb. 26 at Scottsdale.
They’re all but locked into the No. 2 seed for the NJCAA Division I Region I tournament, which will begin March 2.