Long distance barrage helps Point Loma hammer Hawaii Pacific in PacWest semifinals

Raining threes on the Sharks’ parade.

The No. 4-seeded Hawaii Pacific University men’s basketball team saw their PacWest Tournament title hopes flame out on Friday afternoon, falling to No. 1 Point Loma (24-5) in the conference semifinals, 95-66.

Six different Sea Lions finished in double figures in the win, led by all-PacWest 1st-team selection Jaden Matingou’s 20 points and seven assists. Redshirt junior guard Caden Harris tacked on 17 points for PLNU while all-PacWest 3rd-teamer Andrew Hommes drilled all four of his 3-pointers in a 12-point outing that went along with three rejections.

The top-seeded team in the tournament playing in their home gym, Point Loma matched a season-high in made 3-pointers as they bludgeoned HPU in the semifinal rubber match. The Sea Lions shot better than 53% from the floor as a group while draining 16-of-31 attempts from behind the arc.

A hot start by Hommes helped the hosts out to a 16-7 lead over the Sharks before graduate forward Josh Niusulu powered HPU out of a scoring drought with a pair of strong interior finishes and his lone 3-pointer of the afternoon to make it a 23-17 game with 10:57 left in the first half.

Nemanja Sarenac swished his only triple of the game right after to pull the Sharks within three, but that was the closest that Hawaii Pacific could get as the Sea Lions sizzled off a 31-8 run to go into the break leading by 26.

Point Loma torched the HPU defense, shooting 68% from the field while connecting on 8-of-13 from distance in the first half. The Sea Lions also drilled 12-of-14 attempts from the charity stripe, getting four different rotation players into foul trouble for HPU before the break.

Hawaii Pacific opened the second half with a 6-0 run, but three consecutive turnovers quickly killed the momentum right after as PLNU pushed the margin back over 25 by the under-16 media timeout.

Avi Halpert tried to spur one more rally for HPU, but a pair of Jake Lifgren triples sandwiching Tyce Paulsen’s final 3-pointer of the day pushed the lead over 30 for the Sea Lions and sent the game into garbage time early.

Josh Niusulu led the effort for HPU in the loss, scoring 11 points on 5-of-8 shooting in 22 minutes of action as he dealt with foul trouble throughout the day. Quinton McCullough and Kemp Van Es each added 10 points for the Sharks while Quentin Meza and Joshua West were each held to eight points on a combined 4-for-13 shooting from the floor.

Kahiau Bruhn tacked on seven points, hitting all three shots from the field while grabbing a pair of rebounds in nine minutes off the bench.

Top-seeded Point Loma advances to a fourth consecutive PacWest Tournament championship game to face No. 2 Westmont on Saturday at 12 p.m. HT/2 p.m. PT in San Diego. The Sea Lions are the defending conference champions and have won four of the last five PacWest Tournament crowns.

Hawaii Pacific (18-11) will have to wait until Sunday, March 8 to see what their fate is when it gets revealed during the 2026 NCAA Division II Men’s Basketball championship selection show. The Sharks were the No. 7 team in the final West Region ranking before the postseason while Point Loma checked in at No. 3 and Westmont at No. 9 on the same list.

The winner of Point Loma-Westmont will receive the PacWest’s automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament. The CCAA and GNAC tournament champions will also each receive an auto-bid to the national tournament with the final five at-large spots going to the top teams in the final regional ranking.