Ventura College men's basketball went on the road to San Luis Obispo and brought home a vitally important Western State Conference North win defeating Cuesta College 82-76. Four different Pirates scored in double digits topped by Elijah Brown with 34 points. Jalon Wilson and Jacob Alonzo both scored 12 points while Jamal Lewis added 11 points.
Ventura (15-8, 5-2) was riding high on their trip to San Luis Obispo winners of four straight WSC North games and back to back match ups with the only teams ahead of them in the race for the title. Cuesta was able to hand the Pirates a loss in the final seconds the last time the two matched up. A win though put Ventura just one game away from first place in the conference.
VC fell behind after the first five minutes of game play 9-6, but responded over the next four minutes of play to get ahead 19-16. Cuesta rallied to take the advantage at 25-24 with 6:46 left in the first half. When Alonzo hit from long range the Pirates went back on top 32-31 and started to pull away from Cuesta. With just :43 left Brown hit from 3-point range following a jumper to put VC up 39-35 which was where the game stood at the half.
Coming out of the break ahead of the Cougars for the second time this season, VC looked to maintain the advantage and bring home the win. Alonzo hit on back to back 3-pointers and VC was now ahead 50-43 with 15:22 to play. The Pirates pushed their led to 59-49 with another bucket from Brown. The Cougars began to try and claw back into the game getting to within 62-57. but a 3-point play by Brown now pushed VC back up by double digits with 5:46 to play. Cuesta responded to get back within seven and then six points over the final minutes of game play, but were unable to get any closer.
Wilson dished out three assists and Brown added five assists to their double digit point efforts. Trevor LaCount added two blocks and the Pirates as a team forced five steals against the Cougars. Lewis pulled down nine rebounds for the Pirates against the much larger Cuesta team.
Ventura is now within just one game of a first place tie with Cuesta and has gained ground on Moorpark College. This sets up for a huge rivalry matchup with the Raiders for the Pirates. Ventura fell earlier in the season to the Raiders and the pair will now matchup on Wednesday Feb. 3 for a 7:00 pm game at the Ventura College Athletic Event Center.