Occidental improved to 15-1 overall, 6-0 in SCIAC play, and moved from #16 to #12 in the latest D3Hoops.com top 25 rankings released Monday.
Sophomore guard Connor Whitman scored 17 of his season-high 25 points in the second half to lead the Tigers. Whitman tallied the Tigers' last three points with under a minute remaining and hit six three-pointers in the game, two shy of tying a school record. Junior forward Sam Betty, Oxy's leading scorer this season, added 17 points and pulled in eight rebounds.
Pomona-Pitzer scored the first six points of the second half to take its largest lead (seven) with 18:13 remaining. Both teams traded baskets over the next six minutes but a 12-0 Occidental run, sparked by a pair of Whitman three-pointers, gave the Tigers a 45-40 lead at the nine minute mark.
Betty and Whitman provided clutch play on both ends of the floor down the stretch. Betty scored after a Whitman steal, pushing the Oxy lead to five with 3:22 remaining, and blocked Pomona guard David Knowles' jumper moments later.
Whitman hit a jumper to give the Tigers a 52-49 lead with forty seconds remaining, grabbed a crucial offensive rebound after a missed free throw by Zach Phillips '06, and hit the first of two free throw attempts to stretch the lead to 53-49.
Alexander Lloyd, the 2005 SCIAC Player of the Year, nailed a three with :04 left but the Sagehens couldn't convert in the final seconds. Ed Wexler-Beron led Pomona-Pitzer with 18 points on eight of 12 shooting from the floor and grabbed four rebounds.
The final stats show how evenly matched the Tigers and Sagehens were: Oxy went 20 of 52 from the floor (Pomona 21-51), made seven of 20 three-point attempts (Pomona was 4-16), and went 6-15 at the free throw line (Pomona was 6-13). Oxy had 26 rebounds to Pomona's 29, 11 assists to Pomona's 10, and 10 turnovers to Pomona's 13. The only area where Oxy enjoyed a clear advantage was in steals
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Pomona-Pitzer (10-7, 4-2) falls to third place in the league standings behind Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (11-6, 5-1), which downed La Verne 70-58 on Saturday. The first-place Tigers conclude SCIAC round one at Caltech Wednesday, Feb. 1. Tip-off is scheduled for 7:30pm at Braun Gymnasium.