SANTA CLARITA, CALIF. -- Since 1993, no NAIA teams west of the Rockies have been more successful than Azusa Pacific and The Master's. Entering Saturday's game in Santa Clarita, Azusa Pacific had been 140-35 (.800) on the hardwood over the past 5 years with 4 NAIA Tourney appearances notched on its belt. In that same span of time, The Master's had posted a 131-43 (.753) record with 5 straight NAIA Tourney berths. And though Azusa Pacific had the better record, it was the Mustangs who had held the upper hand in the series.

That is until this meeting.

After suffering back-to-back double-digit defeats in Bross Gymnasium, Azusa Pacific turned the table and collected its first win in Santa Clarita since 1993, beating The Master's, 88-79, in a game that wasn't as close as the score might indicate.

Junior T.J. Walker (Modesto, Calif./Modesto HS) led the Cougars with 19 points, followed by Micah Sullivan's (Ellensburg, Wash./Ellensburg HS) season-high 14 on 6-for-7 shooting from the floor.

Azusa Pacific led by 12 points (47-35) at the half and was up by as much as 23 midway through the second half. In fact, the Cougars were still up by 21 (74-53) with 9:35 left in the game before The Master's closed the game with a 26-14 run.

Defense proved to be the difference in this game as the Cougars forced a whopping 30 Mustang turnovers and limited The Master's to just 37.5% (24-for-64) shooting from the floor. Senior reserve Jeremy DeVries (Mt. Vernon, Wash./Mt. Vernon HS) led the Cougar defense with 3 steals to give him 21 in just 5 games.

The Cougars jumped out to an 11-3 lead less than 6 minutes into the game, and pushed the lead to 22-9 after a Corey Smith (San Dimas, Calif./San Dimas HS) 3-pointer and a pair of DeVries free throws with 10:54 left in the first half. After an Andy Newman (Fremont, Calif./ Mission San Jose HS) lay-up, the Cougars upped to lead to 47-27 before The Master's closed the half with an 8-0 run over the final 2 minutes.

Walker then spurred a Cougar 16-4 run early in the second half with 7 of his own points to blow a 54-44 lead into a 70-48 cushion. Junior Jason Boswell (Turlock, Calif./Turlock HS), who entered the game with 60 points in his past 3 games (the best 3-game showing of his career), cooled off but still impacted the offense with a career-high 7 assists to go along with 6 points.

With the win, the Cougars improve to 5-0 on the season to equal their fifth best start in program history. With the loss, The Muster's falls to 3-4.