Slow Start hurts the Cacti

The Copper Mountain College Men's Basketball team never seemed to fully settle in against MiraCosta College on Tuesday, falling in a tight contest despite a hard-fought comeback effort. The Spartans opened the game on a 13-0 run before the Cacti were able to find their first basket at the 15-minute mark.

From there, CMC locked in defensively, forcing MiraCosta into a series of turnovers and outscoring the Spartans 33-21 to trim the deficit to just one heading into halftime.

The second half featured a back-and-forth exchange, with both teams trading leads in a physical, grind-it-out battle. Trailing by three with eight seconds remaining, the Cacti had a chance to tie the game, but an untimely turnover ended their late push and sealed the result.

Amarion Wallace once again led the Fighting Cacti with 19 points, while Tyrece Rose added 16 in a balanced scoring effort.

CMC will now take a short break for the Thanksgiving holiday before returning to action at the Greg Anderson Memorial Tournament, hosted by Antelope Valley College. The Cacti will open against the host AVC Marauders on December 5th at 7 p.m.