Moorpark College men’s basketball fell to Cuesta College on sophomore night 84-66 in Raider Sports Pavilion on Feb. 17 at 3 p.m.

Men’s basketball fell behind in the game early, and could not regain their early lead to defeat the Cougars.

Cuesta started off the game with the first points via a 3-pointer, but found themselves down 4-3 against the Raiders in the first two and a half minutes in the game. Cuesta responded with a 17-8 run, but just like in most games this season for the Raiders, they were never fully out of the game. Moorpark was able to continue their energized play which included a massive dunk by Raiders’ forward Elijah Holts and a big 3-pointer to keep the Raiders within 10 points.

The Cougars’ offense however, was just too much for the Raiders in the first half with them shooting an astounding 47.4 percent from 3-point range, which would not last. The Cougars went into the halftime break with a 46-27 lead over Moorpark. Raiders’ forward Elijah Holts knew that his team was not going to let the lead get too far away from them.

“No matter how much we are down, we are still in any game,” Holts said. “It’s amazing the fight that we have and the fight that we’ve shown all year.”

The Raiders came out of the halftime break proving to everyone that the game was not over yet with a 16-7 run to bring them to within 10 points with the score being 53-43 and only five minutes taken off the second half clock. The Raiders would continue to comeback to bring the score within single digits being down 64-55 with about eight and a half minutes left in the game.

This comeback was coming to an end however, and in the final five minutes of the game, Cuesta was able to secure the victory. From the time that the Raiders were down 64-55 till the final buzzer, the Cougars scored 20 points and held the Raiders to 11 points to win by a score of 84-66. Raiders guard Cole Micek reflected on this being the last game of the season.

“I’m just a little bittersweet right now since it is the last game, but I’m super proud of my guys,” Micek said. “Our record does not show who were are as a team.”

Moorpark was unable to secure the victory on sophomore night; however, the Raiders did accomplish many things this season including a sweep over Oxnard and Santa Barbara City Colleges. Moorpark College men’s basketball finished with a final conference record of 4-6 and an 11-16 overall record. The Raiders lost to the best ranked team in the WSC North, Ventura College, by a total of nine points in both games combined including an overtime appearance against the Pirates. The Raiders also put together some well-played performances against Cuesta and Allan Hancock Colleges.

“It’s easy to look at a result and say, your results speak that it wasn’t a successful season, but I disagree,” said Gerred Link, men’s basketball head coach. “I think that we got better throughout the year.”

Men’s basketball was able to have another bright moment this season with guard Cole Micek and forward Elijah Holts being voted on to the 2018 All Western State Conference Northern Division team.

Moorpark forward and center Garrett Bilby and Justice De Corsi were voted on as honorable mentions as well for the 2018 All Western State Conference Northern Division team.

The Raiders’ stars of the night are the sophomores, Garrett Bilby, Ethan Hermann, Ryan McCarthy, Nicholas Becerra, Cole Micek, and Elijah Holts