IRVINE — UC Irvine’s athletic nickname is, of course, the Anteaters. But to UC Riverside’s men’s basketball program, they might as be the white whale, the character in Moby Dick that was endlessly pursued but never caught.
Or maybe the Highlanders’ pursuit of UCI could be considered a Sisyphean task, with a boulder that they just can’t quite get up the mountain.
UCR and UCI came into Saturday night’s game at the Bren Events Center separated by a half-game in the Big West Conference standings. The gulf looked far more imposing after the Anteaters’ 83-64 victory, on a night when UCI shot 56.7% from the field, held UCR to 35.6%, and outscored the Highlanders 38-20 in the paint, 16-1 on fast-breaks and 22-6 in bench scoring.
This wasn’t a season-breaker, mind you. UCI is 10-3 in conference play (17-8 overall) and a game behind first-place UC Santa Barbara, with a chance to avenge an earlier loss to the Gauchos coming up Wednesday night in Santa Barbara. UCR is 9-5 and 16-10 and tied with Long Beach State for fourth place, with a rematch with LBSU coming up Wednesday night in Riverside.
But, with the conference tournament now four weeks away, in a one-bid league, the idea is to be building to a crescendo. UCR, with starting center Kyle Owens likely done for the season because of injury, needs everyone else at peak efficiency and had much less Saturday night, getting 22 points from Australian freshman Lachlan Olbrich and 12 from senior guard Zyon Pullin on 4-for-11 shooting.
For UCI, junior Dawson Baker scored 23 points on 9-for-14 shooting and fellow junior DJ Davis – from Riverside Poly, and thus one who got away from UCR – added 18 while going 6 for 11 with four 3-pointers. The Anteaters led 38-27 at halftime, broke it open with a 16-5 run early in the second half and led by 28 with 6:44 left.
“That felt like two years ago in the (Big West Tournament) semis (a 78-61 loss in Henderson, Nevada), and just the guys not understanding what it’s going to be like and really the forcefulness that you have to play this game against them,” UCR coach Mike Magpayo said. “That is their identity. So we didn’t meet that challenge.”
And, he added, “I was telling them for the last 48 hours what to expect and sharing with them and bringing the intensity this morning. It started in shootaround. Coach Magpayo was the most intense guy at shootaround. … I think that there needs to be some reflection as a program (to) decide if we’re willing to meet that challenge. If we’re not willing, that’s what it’s going to be like at the Dollar Loan Center.”
For the past five seasons, two under David Patrick and the last three under Magpayo, the Highlanders’ focus has been to build a roster capable of competing with the Anteaters and their trademark physicality and intensity.
UCI coach Russ Turner said he appreciates that sort of respect, but he also noted that the Anteaters have earned it. They’ve compiled a 259-166 overall record in the Turner era, with five regular-season Big West titles, six trips to the conference tournament championship game and two tournament titles since he took over in 2010.
“They’re not the only team in the league who’s trying to figure out how to be like what we’ve been,” Turner said. “You know, when I got the job, I went through the same thing. At that time, Long Beach and Santa Barbara were at the top. And we were trying to figure out what identity for us could be effective here. That’s the million dollar question in trying to build an identity for a college basketball team.”
In Turner’s first season at UCI, after assistant coaching positions at Wake Forest (under Dave Odom) and Stanford (Mike Montgomery) and six seasons as a Golden State Warriors assistant, the Anteaters were 13-19. The next, they were 12-20. In his third season, they were 21-16 and off to the races.
One of the constants at UCI through the Turner era has been defensive intensity, and it’s an interesting phenomenon in college basketball. There’s not a coach in the country who doesn’t preach the importance of defense, but how many actually follow through and make it clear that if you don’t defend, you don’t play?
“Yeah, we preach defense all day in practice,” UCI senior guard Pierre Cockrell said. “Free-throw rebounds is another thing that we’re preaching right now. We gave up a couple of those tonight, which we’ll go back to practice and work on and get better. But yeah, I think we’re a defensive team and when we come out and defend like that at a high level, I think we can win against anybody.”
This was a small sample size, of course. Then again, UCR has lost three of its last four and four out of six without Owens, a 6-foot-8 graduate transfer from Montana who had averaged 10 points, 5.6 rebounds and 24.4 minutes per game overall and 12.6 points and 7.6 rebounds in conference play but was injured on Jan. 19 at UC Davis. The Highlanders were 13-4 with him in the starting lineup, and without him, Olbrich and Jhaylon Martinez have gotten much of the big man minutes.
“We’ve been battling without him, but it makes a difference,” Magpayo said. “He ain’t going to be with us, so it doesn’t matter.”
But if UCI is going to be in the way, here are some sobering numbers for UCR: The Highlanders have now lost six straight to the Anteaters, since a victory in Riverside in February of 2021, and 16 of 17 dating to February 2015, another home victory. In the Turner era, UCI is 19-5 against UCR and hasn’t lost to the Highlanders in the Bren Center since December of 2010.
“I mean, we were really good tonight,” Turner said. “But there’s no way to expect this type of dominance over a team as good as Riverside is. Credit to Coach Magpayo and their staff and administration for where they’ve got that team right now. They’re a good team who had a tough night tonight. … We played really, really well, and I do like the fact that we were good both on offense and defense. But no, there was nothing normal about tonight as far as the way this game went against a quality team like Riverside.”
But from UCR’s vantage point, that white whale isn’t getting any smaller.
jalexander@scng.com