Vintage minimizes turnovers, wins rebounding battle, and goes on huge second quarter run to cruise past Napa in Big Game
By Kyle Foster
Twitter: @NapaKyle @NapaSportsNews
If you hope to win a game, rebounding and not turning the ball over is a great place to start. After all, they both lead to extra possessions for the other side.
In Wednesday night’s Big Game boys’ basketball at Crusher Gym, the Vintage boys’ basketball team won both of those key battles on their way to beating Napa, 75-41.
The Crushers (11-8 overall, 3-2 Vine Valley Athletic League) were able to put the game in the second quarter when they went on a 19-4 run that swelled the lead to 32-14 before Napa scored with 2:10 left till half to end the run. In that quarter, Vintage outscored Napa 27-6 to carry a 45-16 lead into the break.
They were able to gain the advantage thanks to simply not turning the ball over while forcing Napa into a bunch of them. After all, Napa turned the ball over 19 times to Vintage’s 7.
“That’s huge,” Vintage head coach Ben Gongora said on not turning the ball over too much in the game. “That’s been something we’ve been working on. Unfortunately, some guys are still coming along with learning how to do jump stops and ball security. But yeah, we you know, good defense, ball security effort hitting the floor. You know, we need to secure the ball we need to not turn the ball over.”
Another thing the Crushers did well was rebound. They won the battle on the glass 29-20 with some key offensive boards.
“The turnovers have been an issue for us all year. I thought the bigger issue was they were killing us on the offensive glass,” Napa High first-year head coach Carson Carattini said of the rebounding that hurt his team. “One of their guards had four offensive rebounds in the first five minutes of the game and that kind of stuff is that’s gonna kill you every time.”
It also helped that they had a trio of double-digit scorers. Leading the way was Miles MacPherson. The junior forward finished with a game-high of 24 points and brought in 3 rebounds. He made four shots from three-point land and made both free throws. He scored 13 of his points before the break as well.
“I was feeling good,” MacPherson said of his monster night. “It’s always fun to play with these guys. I was feeling it tonight. I made a lot of shots. I made a lot of shots. I was feeling it.”
It was also no secret coming in that this game had a lot of importance for MacPherson after spending the first two years of high school at Napa High.
“It was fun,” MacPherson said of facing the guys he spent the first two years on the court with. “It was a good game. So it’s fun to play against those guys and Big Game’s always a fun game.”
Ben Jackson finished the night with 12 points and 3 rebounds. He was able to do most of his scoring in the first half where he had 8 points.
Also adding to the cause was Elias Alvarez. The two-sport athlete finished the night with 11 points and 5 rebounds. He scored 9 points before the half and converted on 7 of 8 shots from the free-throw line.
“I think the delay was just literally a lack of reps,” Gongora said of Alvarez who has been scoring a lot more lately. “He came from football, and he sat out due to football injuries and he’s had a few bumps along the way. It’s taken time and I know he was frustrated. But right now, he’s been disciplined and been focused, and he’s feeling good and he’s playing much better.”
Others scoring for Vintage in the game were Connor Gongora (6 points, 5 rebounds), Collin Durfee (5 points), Josiah Flynn (5 points), Jace Lopez (4 points, 6 rebounds), Luke Haeuser (4 points, 2 rebounds), Si Sabbagha (2 points, 1 rebound), and Nate Marroquin (2 points).
Napa (3-16, 1-5 VVAL) didn’t have one scorer with double figures in the game. Instead, they had three players who all scored 8 points.
Christian Williams was the one who did the most out of all of them as he finished with 8 points and 4 rebounds. Jayden Quintana (8 points, 2 rebounds), and Nico Franco (8 points) were the others.
“We’ve kind of gotten cold shooting the ball a little bit,” Carattini said of not having any double-digit scorers. “Our shooters, who normally stay hot, have had a harder time getting shots off, I think in league, those kinds of things happen. Opponents become familiar with who you are and they start to gameplan for you so our guys are just learning to adjust to things.”
Rounding out the scoring for the Grizzles were Eli Mindle (7 points, 2 rebounds), Jared Martinez (4 points, 6 rebounds), Will Flynn (3 points, 2 rebounds, 3 blocked shots), and Henry LaLiberte (1 point, 1 rebound).
Both teams will return to action in the coming days. Vintage will host American Canyon on Friday night at 7 PM. Meanwhile, Napa will have the league bye Friday before heading to Martinez for a non-league game against Alhambra before visiting Sonoma Valley on Monday night at 7 PM.
In other VVAL action on Wednesday night, American Canyon beat Petaluma 84-76 and Justin-Siena beat Sonoma Valley 53-47. You can view the updated VVAL standings here.
