Men's Basketball upsets MacTech to advance to championship

The University of Guam Men's Basketball Team played its best game of the Triton Men's Basketball League season on Feb. 17 at the UOG Calvo Field House in the semi-finals of the Triton League tournament. UOG came out on top 89-84 over the No. 2 seeded MacTech Nerds.

MacTech hurt itself before the game even started, as the Tritons hit three technical fouls for three players not having MacTech uniform jerseys on for the game.

The game was close in each quarter as MacTech led 20-19 after the first quarter, and UOG led 46-45 at halftime. The Tritons pulled ahead 71-67 after the third period, and the Nerds could not overtake UOG during the final 10 minutes.

Logan Hopkins hit nine of 12 free throws in the fourth quarter to lead UOG in the final minutes of the game. The Tritons scored 14 of their total 18 points in the fourth period from the free-throw line as MacTech tried to stop the clock.

Hopkins for the Tritons and Chaz Barbour for the Nerds scored 33 points each to lead their teams. Barbour scored 26 of his points in the first half. Aljurrell Grape and Cloyd Rosas each scored 15 points for the Tritons as well.

UOG is now 3-4 in the Triton League while MacTech fell to 4-3 and ended its season.

In the second game that afternoon, the No. 1 seeded Harper Valley Kennel Bulldogs survived a scare from Guam Community College.

GCC led by 14 points (34-20) after the first quarter and held the lead until about halfway through the second period when the Bulldogs came back to lead 54-52 at halftime.

But GCC came back in the third quarter to take a seven-point lead midway through the period, but then the Bulldogs took a timeout and proceeded to press GCC in the final minutes of the period to take a 83-79 lead going into the fourth quarter.

The Bulldogs could not miss to open the fourth quarter, and GCC found itself down by 20 points early in the final 10 minutes of the game. GCC tried to come back but had too deep of a hole to dig out of and lost 120-109.

JP Cruz led the Bulldogs with 43 points and Ethan Alegre scored 44 for GCC.

The Bulldogs are 7-0 in the league and GCC fell to 0-7.

UOG and the Bulldogs will play at 8 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 21 for the Triton League Championship. A Guam select team will play a Russian professional team, Vostok-65, at 6 p.m. that night as well. There will be a charge for the 6 p.m. game, but the 8 p.m. game is free.

Photos by UOG Sports Photographer Victor Consaga