LPC picked the perfect time to play perhaps its finest defense of the season Saturday night.

The Hawks held West Hills Coalinga to 17 points under its scoring averaging in defeating the Falcons 66-57 before a raucous home crowd in the second round of the Northern California regional playoffs.

With the victory—LPC’s second ever in the postseason—the fourth-seeded Hawks (19-9) advanced to Wednesday’s third round against fifth-seeded College of the Sequoias. That game will take place at 7 p.m. in Livermore.

Keith Hunter led LPC with 22 points and 10 rebounds against West Hills (16-11), which entered as the 13^th seed. Brandon Eboigbodin had another double-double with 15 points and 10 rebounds. McKayle Harnell finished with 10 points, and Cameron Moses had 9 points and 12 assists.

But it was the Hawks’ defense that was the story. LPC not only stifled West Hills, which entered averaging 74 points a game, from the floor, but nearly shut out the Falcons from the foul line. West Hills shot only 2 free throws the entire game.

What’s more, LPC committed only 5 fouls, 3 of which came in the first half. The Falcons committed 16.

“Interesting enough, we worked on this defense all year,” said Hawks Coach James Giacomazzi. “We preached, preached defense all week. But we had not played to this effectiveness. It really showed tonight.”

And the Hawks stifled West Hills while playing only 6 players all night. The Falcons’ rotation, meanwhile, went 9 deep.

“We’re in pretty good condition,” Giacomazzi said. “When you’re in the playoffs, you gotta go with your hot hand. We had a good rhythm, good consistency going. If we had subbed, it would’ve changed our consistency. The way we were playing, we had to keep it going.”

LPC led 38-30 at halftime before West Hills switched from a man-to-man defense to a zone to begin the second half. However, Hunter began the half with a three-pointer, giving the Hawks their biggest lead at 41-30.

West Hills then ran off 9 straight points to move within 41-39 before LPC countered with 7 in a row on 3 free throws by Harnell, a Hunter tip, and a Darius Limbrick basket with two players hanging all over him.

The Falcons outscored the Hawks 9-2 to pull within 50-48 with 9:10 remaining. But over the next 7 minutes, LPC held West Hills to just 3 points while scoring 12, assuming control at 62-51 at the 3-minute mark.

West Hills stubbornly remained in its zone while the Hawks let the clock run down. In fact, LPC committed two shot-clock violations down the stretch. The Falcons’ only baskets in the final 2:43 came on 2 threes, but that wasn’t enough as the Hawks got 2 free throws each from Hunter and Kameron Johnson to secure the victory.

Said Giacomazzi, “We executed our game plan to perfection. Our kids worked their tails off, and they are now reaping the rewards.”

Up next is a rematch with Sequoias. The teams met Dec. 3 in the first round of the DVC Classic in Pleasant Hill, and the Hawks came away with a 63-61 victory. Sequoias won its second-round playoff game Friday, 76-70 in overtime against Cabrillo.

Giacomazzi noted that Sequoias was missing its starting guard in the Dec. 3 victory.

“We have some work to do,” he said. “They can shoot it, and their bigs can play.”

Sequoias, incidentally, eliminated the Hawks from last year’s playoffs with a 76-67 win on LPC’s home court.