The crowd was into it and that made for a noisy gym with the stands at the Northern Sport Centre packed with Prince George elementary school students Friday afternoon.
They came to see the UNBC Timberwolves try to shake off a Canada West men’s basketball losing streak against the visiting Fraser Valley Cascades. But on this day there was no victory celebration for the guys in green and gold, who lost 90-67.
The visitors from Abbotsford broke open a close game in the second quarter while out-rebounding the TWolves 15-5 and took a 43-29 lead into the locker room at the half.
In the third quarter, Cascades forward Dario Lopez turned into a one-man wrecking crew, racking up 17 points when he shot eight-for-10 from the field and Fraser Valley (8-9, fifth in Pacific Division) never looked back.
It was the seventh consecutive loss for UNBC (1-14).
Lopez totalled a game-high 25 points and had 12 rebounds. Arpan Singh (14 points), Ismail Hernandez (13) and Clay Kurtz (13) also reached double figures.
Takeshi Croke had five steals and five assists.
Duchess Park graduate Evgeny Baukin collected 16 points and seven rebounds to lead the UNBC cause, while Chris Ainsley finished with 13 points and Josh Gillespie had 10.
The same teams meet again at Brownridge Court Saturday at 7 p.m.
Tonight at 6 p.m. the UNBC women will host Fraser Valley in the first game of a weekend doubleheader.
