With CCAA play now just a week away, the Cal Poly Humboldt men’s basketball team was looking for some momentum heading into the holidays ahead of their conference schedule. The ‘Jacks got just that Tuesday night with a 104-71 win over Northwest Indian College.
“It’s always good to take a couple days for a break, especially for a holiday, off of a win and feel good about that,” ‘Jacks head coach Chris Tifft said. “It kind of motivates you to come back and get to work.”
It was easily Humboldt’s most impressive offensive showing, as the team scored over 100 points for the first time since last December in an overtime game against Chico State. The win brings their record to 2-2 ahead of next Thursday’s date with Cal Poly Pomona.
Freshman guard Rob Diaz once again led the way with his 21 points and three steals, Diaz leads Humboldt in both of those categories on the season.
“Rob is a scorer, and those are hard to find,” Tifft said. “He has the ability to make tough plays. Good basketball teams always have somebody that can go score a basket outside of the offense, or when the offense breaks down, he has that ability.”
Another freshman, forward Sage Wayans had his best game as a Lumberjack with 17 points on 8-11 shooting with a game-high seven rebounds as well as having the game’s most exciting highlight with a soaring transition dunk as the ‘Jacks lead grew in the second half.
Besides Wayans and Diaz, Humboldt’s size and strength seemed to be the key determiner on Tuesday. Humboldt had a +40 difference in points in the paint along with a +9 advantage on the boards. With Humboldt also forcing 15 more turnovers, the 33-point win makes a good bit of sense.
Humboldt’s trio in the post, freshman Pejan Slater, and juniors Jordahn Johnson and Cam Timmons have combined to shoot 60.6% from the field in the season’s first four games, the three of them combined for 19 points and 16 rebounds on Tuesday, but their presence often feels larger than their box score numbers.
“We do have some interior players that have physicality, but our guard play needs to be physical too, that’s one thing we need to improve a little bit on,” Tifft said.
Two Humboldt guards combined for seven three-pointers with junior Emanuel Steward knocking down 4-7 and Arcata High School alum freshman Brandon Bento-Jackson hitting 3-4. After Wednesday, Steward is up to 64% from three albeit just four games into the season.
With such a lopsided game in the second half, Tifft emptied out his bench as 13 ‘Jacks got to see some game action with the Humboldt starters watching with delight seeing the reserves get some burn with the win already in hand.
“They really enjoy being teammates and they pull for each other, they’re unselfish and you could see that tonight on the bench,” Tifft said. “They were excited to see those guys get an opportunity.”
Humboldt opens up their conference schedule with two home games, Thursday against Pomona and then Saturday against San Bernardino, it’ll be Humboldt’s last home game for over a month with five straight road conference games to follow.
Humboldt will face a higher level of competition than Northwest Indian College, but still Tuesday was an important step for the ‘Jacks, a team still learning the system of a new coach while having just one returner, the team is still learning to play with one another but the comfortable win is a step in the right direction with CCAA play on the horizon.
“We’re competitive, we want to be really good, really fast but it’s amazing when you’re with this group, when you watch video or you have practice how much there is to learn and how much growth is needed,” Tifft said, “I told the guys’ after the game that we have a lot of work to do.”
Dylan McNeill can be reached at 707-441-0526.