ARCATA -- Cal State LA's men's basketball team continued to battle with a team severely hampered by injuries and the Golden Eagles could point to a couple of bright spots on Thursday.

Although the Golden Eagles, with just seven players healthy enough to play, fell to Humboldt State, 88-71, in a California Collegiate Athletic Association contest, the Golden Eagles set a new team free-throw shooting mark and got a sensational game from talented freshman Shane Bell. 

Bell poured in a season-high 27 points to lead the Golden Eagles (6-13, and also was a major contributor to the 19-of-19 performance at the free-throw line, which set a new program record. The previous best was a .957 percentage on 22-of-23 shooting against Northeast Oklahoma in 1985. Bell hit all nine of his free-throw attempts, which was just behind the program single-game standard of 12-of-12 set by Shawn Holiday in 1984. More recently, Duce Zaid was 11-of-11 in 2016.

Bell, who was limited to just seven minutes due to injury against Stanislaus State on Saturday, was sensational Thursday. He was 8-of-14 from the floor and hit two of four attempts from 3-point range. He easily surpassed his previous season high of 13 and reached double figures in scoring for the third time this season. Ben Uloko had 11 points and two rebounds and Alexander Sokol had 11 points, five rebounds and two assists.

Jaden Edwards had a game-high 31 points and 13 rebounds to lead Cal Poly Humboldt (11-14, 5-14 CCAA), while AJ Sims had 17 points.

Justin Collins had a season-high eight points for the Golden Eagles, including a pair of 3-pointers, while freshman Kyjuan Cannady had eight points, five rebounds and six assists. Sean Estes added six points, while Jaden Lazo had a pair of steals in his 19 minutes of playing time.

Cal State LA shot 41.1 percent (23-of-56) and was 6-of-19 from 3-point range. Cal Poly Humboldt shot 53.2 percent (33-of-62) and was sizzling from 3-point range, hitting 15-of-28 (53.6 percent). Cal State LA was 19-of-19 from the free-throw line, while Cal Poly Humboldt was 7-of-12. Cal Poly Humboldt had a big 38-21 rebounding edge and committed 15 turnovers to just 10 for the Golden Eagles.

Cal State LA was even at the half, 31-31, but got outscored in the second period, 57-40.

Cal State LA will conclude the regular season with a game at Sonoma State on Saturday.


 


 

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