The Irvine Valley men's basketball team continued its strong finish to the 2008-09 season with a 58-41 win at Santa Ana in an Orange Empire Conference game last Friday night.
IVC has won two straight games and three of its last four. The one loss was a contest in which it played Riverside, which was ranked second in the state at the time, down to the final minute.
The win last Friday improved Irvine Valley's record to 13-17 overall and 3-8 in conference. Santa Ana fell to 12-16 overall and 2-9 in conference.
Both teams struggled to get started offensively and played to a 5-5 tie five minutes into the game. IVC answered with back-to-back three-pointers to take an 11-6 lead.
Despite both teams continuing to shoot cold, the Lasers were able to pull away from the Dons late in the half with their largest lead of the first half coming at half time at 27-16.
The Dons slowly chipped away at the Lasers lead in the second half. Santa Ana pulled to within 38-32 with nine minutes left.
But IVC responded with a 20-9 run to end the game and win by a final score of 58-41.
The Lasers shot just 35.0 percent as a team in the game, but held Santa Ana to only 25.4 percent. Santa Ana was also only 3 of 27 from three-point range.
Irvine Valley was led by sophomore forward Brandon Hucks, who finished with 17 points and six rebounds. Hucks made 7 of 11 shots from the floor.
Sophomore forward Jon Reed added 15 points, five rebounds and three assists.
Sophomore guard Jeff Ledbetter added nine points and five steals and sophomore forward Carlos Pinto finished with a team-high and season-high 10 rebounds.
IVC committed just seven turnovers in th game, one of its lowest totals of the season.
The Lasers finish the regular season on Wednesday night at Cypress at 5:30 p.m.