The scheduled 4 p.m. tip-off of the game to decide the champion of this weekend’s Gaucho Tip-Off Classic Men’s Basketball Tournament between Saddleback and Riverside City colleges had to be postponed, Sunday.

It had to be postponed because Cerritos and Long Beach City colleges were still on the hardwood, engaged in the last few minutes of an on-court war that was to determine the weekend’s third and fourth place tournament finishers.

In games played Friday and Saturday, each team had amassed one win and one loss.

Cerritos won its Friday night game against Santa Barbara City, 78-35, and dropped its Saturday night game against Saddleback, 64-44.

Long Beach won its Friday night game against L.A. Trade Tech, 73-64, and like Cerritos dropped its Saturday night game. The Vikings lost to Riverside, 72-69.

The victor of this game would take home third place honors, and a winning 2-1 record, while the loser would be the fourth place team, and own a losing record of 1-2.

Long Beach City won, 74 – 68, but the final score is not indicative of how close the game actually was. Regulation ended in a 63 – 63 tie, and it took an overtime period to finally decide the game.

The game was so close that except for only a few occasions, neither team had more than a two, and rarely a three-point lead.

Even the Riverside and Saddleback players, who had come out of their locker rooms expecting to warm up for their game grabbed courtside seats to witness the exciting final minutes of the game.

At 4:10 p.m., when overtime got underway, everybody in the gym just buckled up their seat belts for five extra minutes of the madness, which actually lasted 18 minutes.

Freshman guard DeJuan Wilson, who was named All Tournament Player for Cerritos and presented with a plaque for his achievement, started the extra period off with a three-point basket to give his team the early lead.

But just like in regulation play, Long Beach came right back and answered with a three-point play of its own.

After Long Beach made two more free throws, Wilson came back to make one of his own to put the Falcons within one, 68 – 67.

With 1:46 to play in the period, sophomore forward Aaron Hamilton made one of two free throws to give the Falcons their sixty-eighth and final point of the game.

From that point on Cerritos looked like a completely different team as it turned the ball over on almost every possession, while Long Beach pulled away for the win.

Being that this game was played so early in the season, Wilson viewed it as a “good experience.” He thought there was a lack of communication between his teammates during the turnover filled final minute-and-a-half of play, and said the team “[needs] to be able to settle down” in situations like Sunday’s.

Cerritos started the tournament with a huge victory over Santa Barbara City College Friday night.

Defensively, the Falcons absolutely smothered Santa Barbara, holding it to only 11 points in the first half, and 24 in the second.

Although Cerritos College Head Coach, Gary Cain was not thrilled with his team’s offensive performance, he said, “Defensively we played well. . . . One of the reasons is we didn’t have to run a whole lot of offense. We were running the shot clock down, getting into the ball line and making steals. You know, when you get layups on the other end, you don’t have to run any offense.”

That lack of offensive production became a factor in the Falcons’ second game Saturday night against Saddleback College.

After playing a pretty close first half, and leading, 34-31, Saddleback really picked up its intensity on defense in the second half, and Cerritos did not have an answer for it.

The Falcons scored only 10 points in the second half, and ended up losing, 64-44.

Saddleback player, Kevin Williams later said, “In the locker room (during halftime) we knew we had to go out there and get offensive boards, move the ball around better, keep them away from the offensive boards and just out run them.”

The Falcons’ top scorer on the night, freshman guard Ryan Reyes, said he felt that Saddleback might have had a slight edge over his team because it had a chance to watch Cerritos play the night before.

There might have been some validity to that statement as Williams later said, “We scouted out their players, we knew who the shooters were.”

When the tournament was over, Wilson said, “I hope we take our win and run with it, and take the losses and learn from them, and just hopefully play harder and know what we’ve got to do for the rest of the year, and stay focused.”