San Domenico vaults out to lead early, is able to maintain it thanks to points in paint to beat Justin-Siena
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
If you want to win, getting off to a good start goes a long way. You just can’t face an early hole and expect to come back.
Getting off to a good start is even more important when you’re facing the defending CIF State Division 5 champions.
On Saturday, it was a sluggish start that bit the Justin-Siena girls’ basketball team when they lost to San Domenico of San Anselmo, 41-25.
The Panthers (8-0) started quite fast in this one. In the blink of an eye, they were up 8-0 before the Braves could register a basket. But after that point, Justin-Siena (4-3) was able to claw back and get to within six points at the end of the quarter.
“I thought they did a really good job of taking away our opportunities at the basket,” Justin-Siena head coach Andy Bettencourt explained. “It seemed like every time we drove or went inside, there was someone waiting for us. Unfortunately, we just could not get an outside shot to fall and so usually if you can hit an outside shot, you can extend the defense a little bit, but we really didn’t make them have to extend out too much. They just did a really nice job of taking away our inside game.”
However, as the game went on San Domenico was able to pull away due to their solid play in the paint. They were able to get layups and short jumpers that were converted easily.
“I thought they did a really nice job of moving without the ball,” Bettencourt said of the hard time his team had stopping the Panthers in the paint. “A couple of times we were late on rotations in terms of getting to secondary help. It’s just something that we got to clean up and you know, honestly, teams do get some shots inside on us but a lot of times we’re okay with it because of our height inside. We can contest a lot of stuff and look you hold that team to 41 points you’re actually doing a pretty good job. I haven’t seen the shooting percentages, but I don’t think their shooting percentage was crazy good.”
The Braves went on their own run and made it a four-point game in the second quarter. That would be as close as they would get the whole game.
Justin-Siena also utilized their half-court 2-3 zone trap to force some of those turnovers when they made their lone run of the game in the second frame.
“We actually ran that throughout the game in different spots, I think every quarter except the first,” the coach said of the half-court trap’s effectiveness. “It definitely helps. It’s a defensive we can only play at certain times with certain personnel. But it definitely is nice to change up defenses and throw something different at a team and I thought did cause a little confusion for sure.”
After getting out to a 4-0 start to begin the season, Justin-Siena has now dropped their last three games. Part of that is the fact that the competition has been a step up.
“Level of competition is the first thing,” Bettencourt pointed out. “We’ve played much better teams the last three games than our first four – no respect to the first four teams we played but today we played the defending D5 state champions. Healdsburg is 10 and 2 I think. Ukiah won the tournament we were in and is 7 and 2. So we’re just playing really good teams.”
Leading the way for the Braves was Jordan Washington. She finished the night with a team-high 8 points, 5 rebounds, and a blocked shot. The sophomore center also converted 2 of 5 shots from the free-throw line.
After that, it was pretty rough for Justin-Siena. But they did have a pair of players notch 5 points in the game. Lauren Keller finished with 5 points and 3 rebounds. Also, Emery Messenger scored finished with 5 points.
Others rounding out their scoring were Mary Heun (3 points, 3 rebounds), Bella Balmaceda (3 points), and Megha Jackson (1 point, 1 rebound).
Justin-Siena will now have a few days off before they’re back in action. They’ll be hosting the first-ever Justin-Siena Christmas Classic that will feature both boys’ and girls’ teams for the Braves. In the game on Tuesday, it will be another tough test against Monte Vista-Danville at 4:30 PM.
