Justin-Siena starts fast, takes early double-digit lead, and evens out scoring to beat Rodriguez
By Kyle Foster
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One of the best things that can happen in a game is to even out the scoring. It shows that the offense is efficient as well.
On Tuesday night at the Clark Gym, the Justin-Siena boys’ basketball team spread out the scoring to beat Rodriguez-Fairfield, 67-42.
Besides the evened-out scoring the Braves (3-0) started the game extremely fast. After gaining an early 4-2 lead, Justin-Siena then went on an 8-0 run that lasted till there was 3:46 left in the frame.
During the first half, the Braves played a swarming defense that made it hard for the Mustangs (4-3) to get their speed and prevent the breaks that could get their offense going from happening.
“Well, we talk about it from the standpoint of a standard,” Justin-Siena head coach and athletic director George Nessman said of the defense his team played early on to get a big lead. “We set a standard for ourselves, and every player in our program can meet the standard, and it involves defensive intensity of movement, it involves being in the right position involves really giving full effort all the time. That’s hard to hit that every moment of the game. But I thought we did that more than we didn’t tonight.”
Another reason Justin-Siena was able to jump out to a 41-18 lead at the half was the fact that they slowed down the game and kept it in the half-court, which also prevented fast breaks from happening. To do this, meant they had to take care of the ball, which they did. In the first half, they turned the ball over just 3 times.
“We were really concerned about their ability to turn people over and they turned us over a lot in the second half, as you saw,” Nessman said of minimizing the turnovers in the first half. “But in the first half, we only had three turnovers and I thought that was really the key to the game. We handled their press and their pressure and that slows them down because a lot of their uptempo basketball comes off of steals and loose balls and misdirected passes that they turned the other way real quickly, and we took that away. Plus we did a good job on the offensive glass. We made them stay home and rebound by going to the offensive glass hard too.”
Of course, the other thing that was key was the fact that they spread out the scoring very well in this game. In the game, they had three scorers with 14 or more points.
“It’s really good for us,” Nessman said of the even scoring. “We’ve been really concerned that our scoring wasn’t being balanced, and it’s proven different so far. And that’s been a really good development for our team. We’re sharing the ball. We’re taking good shots, and that lends itself to more balanced scoring.”
Leading Justin-Siena in the game was Charlie Vaziri. The junior forward finished with a team-high of 16 points and 11 rebounds to finish the game with a double-double. He had a great first quarter where he scored 12 points, which would be his first-half tally as well. Vaziri also made both of his free throws in the game.
“Charlie is a smart basketball player that really brings a grit and toughness to the game,” Nessman said of Vaziri. “And then a high level of intelligence. And you can see he gets a lot done for us.”
Nick Jeremaz added 15 points, 7 rebounds, and a blocked shot. He scored 9 points in the second half as well. The senior guard also made all 5 of his free throws.
The last double-digit scorer in the game was Jaden Washington. The senior center finished with 14 points, 6 rebounds, and a blocked shot. Washington scored 8 points after the break while going 1-for-3 at the charity stripe.
Others scoring for the Braves in the game were Dallas Logwood (6 points, 1 rebound), Andrew Grimshaw (5 points, 2 rebounds), Dylan Arnold (4 points), Asa Hightower (2 points, 4 rebounds), Chase Briskovich (2 points, 1 rebound), Josh Madayag (2 points), and Justin Mangelson (1 point, 1 rebound).
Justin-Siena will be back in action after a few days off on Friday at 5 pm when they meet Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep in the Christian Bros Classic at De La Salle in Concord. You can view the two-day tournament bracket here. The other side of the four-team bracket features De La Salle and Saint Mary’s-Berkeley at 6:30 on Friday.
