By Esteban Ramirez
Sports Editor

Behind a gritty defensive effort, the CSU Bakersfield men’s basketball team pulled out a 55-40 win against Utah Valley University in the first round of the Western Athletic Conference Tournament at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas on March 12.
CSUB held UVU to 26.7 percent shooting from the floor and forced the Wolverines into 15 turnovers.
“We take pride in our defense,” junior forward Kevin Mays, who finished with 14 rebounds said. “Sometimes we have mental lapses on defense but that’s what it is going to take. Everybody can score the ball, but it’s about who is going to make those stops. That’s what it is going to take to win a championship because offense wins games but defense wins championships.”
The Roadrunners came out of the gates strong building a 10-0 lead in the first five minutes. However, the Wolverines were able to respond thanks to junior guard Donte Williams, who finished with a game-high 15 points. CSUB still was able to take a 24-22 lead into halftime.

At the start of the second half, it was UVU came out on fire thanks to five straight points from sophomore forward Zach Nelson. Then the Wolverines pushed their lead to 31-24 with 16:13 left in the game. However, after a media timeout, the Roadrunners responded with a 7-2 run and were only down to the Wolverines 33-31 with 11:52 left in the game. CSUB then took the lead back with a three-point shot from redshirt-senior guard Javonte Maynor and extended that lead with a three-point play from redshirt-freshman guard Brent Wrapp.
“The reason we got down early in the second half they hit shots and we didn’t,” Maynor said. “It was close already and that opened the lead for them. I just knew that my team needed a bucket at that time, so if I can make some baskets for us, it’ll give us a great chance to win the game.”
Thanks to their defense the Roadrunners were able to put the Wolverines away.
“I thought we had guys really step up,” CSUB coach Rod Barnes said. “I thought defensively we were who we are. We are OK with making the game ugly. We just wanted to win and move on to the next game.”
Senior guard Tyrell Corbin led the Roadrunners with 13 points. Mays added a game-high 14 rebounds.
Mays was also given the assignment of covering UVU’s Nelson, who gave CSUB problems in the previous two meetings as he averaged 25 points per game vs. CSUB. Mays was able to hold Nelson to 12 points in this game.
“I don’t say this a lot about other players but I got great respect for him,” Mays said. “Last game, he made a comment to me. He said, ‘you’re a great defensive player. I love the way you guard me.’ I took because of how much points he scored (29 points) that he loved the way I guarded because he could score points. [Therefore], ever since that day, I have been dwelling on it and I’ve been thinking about it. I just couldn’t walk away from this game knowing that he got the best of me man to man.”
Maynor, who finished with nine points, said he challenged some of his teammates before the game.
“Coming out to this game, I told them ‘are you guys ready for this? You guys have been talking. Let me see what you guys are about,’ and they really surprised me,” Maynor said. “They came out playing hard defense, diving on the floor, getting steals so I’m really immpressed with my team.”
Barnes added that they wanted to get a chance to face No. 1 seed New Mexico State University in the semifinals, which will be today at 6 p.m. in the Orleans Arena.
“It’s going to be a big challenge for us, but as I told our guys this is what we wanted,” Barnes said. “I think everyone here who believed they were going to win this tournament they knew they had to beat them at some point and we get that opportunity tomorrow. We will get some rest today and we will be ready to go.”