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GAME NOTES: The University of Portland Pilots play their final West Coast Conference game of the regular season tonight as they settle in against the Santa Clara Broncos at the Chiles Center.

Portland, which still has Lewis & Clark College on the schedule for March 2nd, has won four of its last five outings thanks to a 70-59 defeat of San Francisco on Thursday night. With that most recent victory, the team is now 9-4 in conference.

As for the Broncos, they have struggled to be competitive since late December and have a total of just four wins since December 23rd. The squad is coming off an 88-71 loss to league champion Gonzaga two nights ago, marking the second straight setback and the third in four games for a program that is just 3-10 versus the rest of the WCC this season.

Santa Clara came into the season with a huge 54-24 advantage in the all-time series with the Pilots, but it was Portland that logged a 74-52 win in the first meeting at the Leavey Center back on January 30th.

The Broncos did little to slow down nationally-ranked Gonzaga a few nights back as the Bulldogs won their 10th straight conference title. The Broncos shot only 34.0 percent from the floor, including 4-of-14 behind the three- point line, 13-of-25 at the charity stripe and turned the ball over 15 times. Niyi Harrison and Marc Trasolini both tallied 13 points as the only double- digit scorers for the visitors. Trasolini leads all active players in both scoring and rebounding with averages of 14.0 points and 6.2 rebounds per contest, while Robert Smith checks in with 12.3 ppg, but clearly this group has been floundering ever since Kevin Foster (19.8 ppg) broke his right foot in early December. As a group the Broncos are shooting only 29.7 percent behind the three-point line, contributing little to their 64.5 ppg.

Portland fell behind by as many as 10 points just seven minutes into the first half, but the Pilots fought back, claimed a two-point edge at the break and eventually captured the 11-point victory at home thanks to 12 three-pointers on the night. Jared Stohl made good on 6-of-10 beyond the arc as he finished with 20 points and Nemanja Mitrovic added 20 points on 5-of-9 out on the perimeter as well. Robin Smeulders contributed 13 points in an effort to cover up three other starters who combined for only 11 points on 3-of-12 shooting from the floor. Smeulders is second on the list of active scoring leaders with his 12.6 ppg, trailing T.J. Campbell (13.6 ppg) who is at the top only because Nik Raivio (14.1 ppg, 6.1 rpg) is still out of action because of his strained right Achilles. Campbell, one of the most reliable three-point shooters (.433) is also responsible for handing out 5.5 apg in order to keep the rest of his teammates involved in the action.

Portland has been holding up extremely well in the last few weeks with its leading scorer on the sideline and now that these guys have learned to play with each other, there's no reason to think it will stop now.