SAN DIEGO, Calif. -- Dennis Vanzant's 22-foot jumper with 17 seconds left in overtime highlighted an amazing comeback in which Azusa Pacific rallied from a 15-point halftime deficit to beat the University of San Diego, 78-77, in the the semifinals of the 10th Annual Point Loma Tournament in Golden Gymnasium, Friday evening. With the victory, APC will meet Taylor University (Ind.) in tomorrow night's tournament championship game after the Trojans upset tournament host Point Loma in the other semifinal.

Vanzant secured the Cougars' place in tomorrow's title game by capping a 31-point performance tonight against USD with an arching bomb.  The Toreros had one last chance to win the game, but they missed a jumper with only a few seconds remaining, and APC secured the rebound of the errant shot to clinch what 45 minutes earlier seemed to be an improbable victory.

USD jumped all over the Cougars from the opening tip and put the pedal to the metal, highlighted by a late-half run that gave the Toreros a seemingly insurmountable 46-31 advantage at the break.  Yet, behind Vanzant and Ric Reed, APC turned the table, opening the second half with a 9-2 run to pull to within 8 at 48-40.  Another run got the Cougars to within 1 at 51-50.    They eventually knotted the score at 64-64 with 3-and-a-half minutes left and capped a 15-7 run to assume a surprising 69-65 lead with 1:10 left in the game.

However, USD held the Cougars scoreless the rest of regulation, and when Pete Cosemza nailed a 10-foot jumper with 8 seconds left in regulation, USD tied the game at 69-69 and forced overtime.  In the extra frame the Cougars played without 6-foot-7 junior forward Mike Leatherby, who had fouled out of the game.  The two teams traded leads until Vanzant's game-winning shot.

Reed dropped a game-high 36 points to lead all players.  Combined with Vanzant, the duo's 67 points surpasses the 61 they scored in last night's win over Olivet Nazarene as their best combined effort of the season.  Over their past 3 games, all Cougar victories, Reed (33.7) and Vanzant (29.0) are averaging a combined 62.7 points a game.

The Cougars' record improves to 10-2 on the season, while San Diego, which drops its first meeting ever with Azusa Pacific, falls to 6-5 and will play Point Loma in Saturday's third-place game.