AZUSA, Calif. -- Once considered the strength of Azusa Pacific's surge to the top of the Pacific West Conference standings, the defense faltered in the final minute for the third straight game as Hawai'i Pacific rallied in the final minute for an 83-80 upset of the No. 19-ranked Cougars Monday night at the Felix Event Center.

Statistically, Azusa Pacific has the PacWest's best defense as measured by opponent shooting percentages, but the Cougars surrendered 17 offensive rebounds and only forced eight turnovers from the Sharks despite holding HPU to a 35 percent (24-for-69) shooting performance. Meanwhile, 18 Azusa Pacific turnovers resulted in 27 points off turnovers for Hawai'i Pacific, which also tallied 16 second chance points in the narrow three-point win.

"I give Hawai'i Pacific a ton of credit for competing tonight," Azusa Pacific head coach Justin Leslie said. "It felt like they did not execute their stuff perfectly, but they defended with a passion and crashed the rebounds harder on a poor shooting night to find a way to get 17 offensive rebounds. We haven't consistently boxed out, we haven't consistently executed, and we haven't consistently made good decisions when we've gotten into the lane. If you don't do the little things, you're not going to have success."

Senior guard Bruce English gave the Cougars a one-point lead, 77-76, with a leaning jumper off the glass with just under a minute left in the game, but Elliott DeFreitas was fouled on the ensuing possession and sank a pair of free throws to give Hawai'i Pacific the lead for good. Jordan Martin sank two more from the line after coming up with a steal on Connor Peterson's drive to the basket with under 30 seconds left, and Chauncey Orr added another pair of free throws after rebounding a missed potential game-tying three-pointer with less than 10 seconds remaining.

Senior guard LyDell Cardwell kept things interesting by hitting a three-pointer with four seconds left, trimming the HPU lead to 82-80, and after Rema Lascelles missed the second of a two-shot foul, English's desperation halfcourt heave sailed off the mark as time expired.

English finished with a game-high 22 points, and junior forward Will Ward (12 points) and sophomore forward Austin Dyer (11 points) joined him in double figures. Hawai'i Pacific was led by Martin and Orr, who scored 22 points apiece. Martin scored 18 of his 22 in the first half, hitting six-of-seven three-pointers, while Orr scored 16 of his 22 after halftime.

With the loss, its third in a row, Azusa Pacific falls into a second-place tie with Hawai'i Pacific, which has won 10 of its last 12 to climb into PacWest title contention. The Cougars are now 15-6 overall and 9-4 in the PacWest, while the Sharks improve to 14-6 overall, 9-4 PacWest. Both teams trail the conference leader, which is first-year PacWest member Concordia, which defeated BYU-Hawaii Monday night to move to 12-2 in PacWest play.

"Something I've said to my teams over the years is that the habits you harp on a team about that aren't addressed in the preseason are ultimately the ones that cost you games at the end of a season," Leslie said. "We have continued to make the same mistakes throughout the year, and it's come back and started to kill us. There are some changes that I have to make, both in who plays and for how long, as well as what plays we're running, because what we're doing right now just isn't working."

Azusa Pacific trailed by two points at halftime, 36-34, and after five lead changes in the first seven minutes of the second half, HPU reeled off 10 straight points to take a 59-52 lead with 9:30 remaining. During the Sharks' 10-0 run, the Cougars had four possessions result in turnovers while HPU had two scoring possessions kept alive by offensive rebounds.

A pair of Colfax Nordquist free throws with 3:25 left gave HPU a 72-64 advantage, its largest lead of the game, before Peterson converted a conventional three-point play and hit a game-tying three-pointer during a 10-2 run that evened the score at 74-74 with 1:38 left. After Orr knocked down two free throws to push the Sharks back in front, 76-74, Peterson made one-of-two from the line, and sophomore forward Petar Kutlesic rebounded the missed second free throw to set up English's go-ahead bucket with 53 seconds to play.

After dropping the first two games of its current six-game homestand, Azusa Pacific will return to action on Friday, Feb. 5, hosting a BYU-Hawaii squad which sits only a half-game out of the second-place position shared by Azusa Pacific and Hawai'i Pacific in the PacWest standings.