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Falcons Give Looney Win in His SPU Debut
Banchero, Larrieu lead 82-59 exhibition rout of Simon Fraser
Ryan Looney made his debut on the SPU sidelines Friday
11/6/2009 9:08:16 PM
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SEATTLE -- Game No. 1 was actually No. 151 for Ryan Looney.
The Looney era of Seattle Pacific men’s basketball began in emphatic fashion on Friday night as Chris Banchero and Brandon Larrieu scored 13 points apiece, leading an 82-59 rout of Simon Fraser in an exhibition game at Brougham Pavilion.
Looney took over as the Falcons’ head coach this year after longtime coach Jeff Hironaka left to take an assistant’s position at Washington State.
Friday was Looney’s debut on the SPU sidelines during a game.
“All the guys before the game in the locker room were trying to give me a hard time about being my first time out,” he explained. “I tried to explain to them that it’s not my first rodeo, it’s actually number 151.”
Prior to arriving in Seattle, the 33-year-old Looney coached five seasons at Eastern Oregon where he compiled a 95-55 record. He led EOU to the past two NAIA tournaments, including a spot in last season’s quarterfinals.
“I just kind of looked at it like it was another game for me,” said Looney. “I didn’t want to get caught up in the moment too much and just tried to let the guys, in an exhibition setting, get a feel for what I’ll be like on a normal game day.”
If Friday is any indication of what a normal game day will be like for SPU, the Falcons will be just fine under their new mentor.
Junior point guard Banchero (Seattle/O’Dea HS) hit 3-of-5 shots from the floor and 7-of-8 from the foul line. Senior wing Larrieu (Puyallup, Wash./Franklin Pierce HS) drained 4-of-7 from the floor. Senior post player Rafael Moreira (Brasilia, Brazil) added 10 points for SPU.
Chas Kok led Simon Fraser with 14 points and Matt Kuzminski added 12.
The Falcons jumped to a 9-0 lead, opening the game with a 10-footer by Banchero, back-to-back buckets by Larrieu (including a 3-pointer), and a putback by Moreira.
Simon Fraser used a 7-0 spurt to cut SPU’s 14-2 lead to 14-9 at the midpoint of the half. The Clan was within six at 19-13 when the Falcon strung together nine straight points, essentially taking command for good.
SPU limited the Clan to 19 first-half points, while scoring 42 on the offensive end.
“For our first time out together, especially in the first half, we did a good job defensively. We also made some progress offensively,” Looney said. “The biggest issue right now is we don’t have the proper practice habits. We struggle to maintain our intensity for an entire two hours. That carried over into the second half of tonight’s game.
“Every day we seem to have a little bit of a lull and tonight ours was right at the beginning of the second half on defense.”
Simon Fraser got as close as 14 early in the second half at 51-37. Seattle Pacific responded with a 13-2 run, started on two consecutive treys by junior wing Jeff Downs (Kirkland, Wash./Bellevue Christian HS).
The team’s penchant for letting up on occasions was the main topic of conversation during breaks.
“When we got a chance to talk during timeouts that was one of the things that we talked about. We identified that we have those moments in practice every day, we tried to identify that we were in one of those moments again today and we were trying to find which guys on our roster had enough toughness to help us get out of it.
“We have some guys on the team with experience that helped us out of it.”
The Falcons return four starters from last season’s team that posted a 19-10 record, placed third in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Division II Tournament. Looney seeks to extend SPU’s current streak of postseason appearances to six.
The Falcons shot 53.2 percent from the field (25 of 47) against SFU, including 41 percent (7 of 17) from 3-point range. The Clan hit 45.3 percent from the field (24 of 53). After shooting just 32 percent (8 of 25) in the first half, SFU made 57 percent (16 of 28) of its second-half attempts.
Seattle Pacific had a 35-25 advantage on the boards, led by the six rebounds of sophomore post player Jake Anderson (Burlington, Wash./Burlington-Edison HS).
The Falcons featured a balanced attack with 11 different scorers and 12 different players grabbing at least one rebound.
“My teams have always kind of been like that, a lot because of our system on offense. We try to do the best that we can in regards to talking about unselfishness,” Looney said. “In time it will probably be that way, but it’s a little bit deceiving tonight because of the balance of our minutes.”
Fourteen players saw action for SPU, including freshmen Scott Morse (Central Point, Ore.) and Alex Mar (Mountlake Terrace, Wash./King’s HS), who made their collegiate debuts. Junior Ryan Sweet (Port Orchard, Wash./South Kitsap HS), a transfer from Whatcom (Wash.) Community College, made his first appearance in a Falcons’ uniform.
SPU has never lost in four games against Simon Fraser, which will join the Falcons in the GNAC next season. The Burnaby, B.C.-based school is the first college from outside the United States to be accepted as a member of the NCAA.
Seattle Pacific improved to 12-11 all-time in exhibition games.
The SPU men play a final exhibition contest next Saturday, Nov. 14 at 7 p.m. in Brougham against the Blue Angels, a team of former Pacific Northwest college standouts. The regular-season opener against Dominican is Friday, Nov. 20 at home in the first day of the Sodexo Tip-Off Classic.
NCAA Men's Basketball
Friday, November 6, 2009
Brougham Pavilion/Seattle, Wash.
SEATTLE PACIFIC 82, SIMON FRASER 59
SIMON FRASER
Kok, Chas 6-13 1-3 14; Kuzminski, Matt 4-12 4-6 12; Burke, Sean 3-4 1-1 7;
Milne, Tallon 3-5 0-0 6; Shaw, Kevin 2-3 0-0 6; Paredes, Chris 3-4 0-0 6;
Burrell, Eric 2-4 0-0 4; Gillies, Gregory 1-3 0-0 3; Pribilsky, Kevin 0-3
1-4 1; Frehlick, Zach 0-0 0-0 0; Nostedt, Jordan 0-2 0-0 0. Totals 24-53
7-14 59.
SEATTLE PACIFIC
Larrieu, Brandon 4-7 3-3 13; Banchero, Chris 3-5 7-8 13; Moreira, Rafael 5-9
0-4 10; Sweet, Ryan 4-5 0-0 9; Downs, Jeff 2-4 3-4 9; Anderson, Jake 1-2 5-6
8; Wardell, Adam 1-3 4-4 6; Diederichs, Rob 2-5 0-0 5; Morse, Scott 2-3 0-0
4; Campanaro, Chauncey 1-4 2-2 4; Vranes, Colby 0-0 1-2 1; McHugh, Mark 0-0
0-0 0; Hope, Grant 0-0 0-0 0; Mar, Alex 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 25-47 25-33 82.
Simon Fraser.................. 19 40 - 59
Seattle Pacific................ 42 40 - 82
3-point goals--Simon Fraser 4-12 (Shaw, Kevin 2-2; Gillies, Gregory 1-1;
Kok, Chas 1-4; Pribilsky, Kevin 0-2; Nostedt, Jordan 0-1; Burke, Sean 0-1;
Kuzminski, Matt 0-1), Seattle Pacific 7-17 (Larrieu, Brandon 2-4; Downs,
Jeff 2-4; Diederichs, Rob 1-3; Anderson, Jake 1-1; Sweet, Ryan 1-2; Wardell,
Adam 0-1; Banchero, Chris 0-2). Fouled out--Simon Fraser-Burrell, Eric,
Seattle Pacific-None. Rebounds--Simon Fraser 25 (Milne, Tallon 6), Seattle
Pacific 35 (Anderson, Jake 6). Assists--Simon Fraser 10 (Gillies, Gregory
3), Seattle Pacific 18 (Diederichs, Rob 5). Total fouls--Simon Fraser 28,
Seattle Pacific 19. Technical fouls--Simon Fraser-None, Seattle
Pacific-None. A-316
Records
Seattle Pacific 0-0, 0-0 GNAC.
Simon Fraser 1-0, 1-0 Canada West.
Next game -- Blue Angels at Seattle Pacific (exhibition), Saturday, Nov. 14, Brougham Pavilon, 7 p.m.
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