On Monday, Nov. 27, it was Bret Harte coming to town.
“The freshmen won 50-34. This group is very committed and we’re looking forward to what’s in store for them,” said varsity head coach Nate Bartelink. “The JV lost 45-41; they held a 41-39 lead with under two minutes to go, and did not finish well.”
For the varsity, the Cougars got the victory, 65-56, with a 14-10 scoring edge in the opening quarter and building up a 33-23 lead at the half. They outscored Bret Harte 18-15 in the third and then were outscored, 18-14 in the final frame but had enough of a cushion to win.
Ethan Garza paced the team with 20 points while Frank Richard Barrera added 15 points and 18 rebounds. Ben Fletcher had 11 points and 11 rebounds; Ben Ferreira added nine points
“I was interested to see how we’d play in our first game. We had mixed results in our few preseason scrimmages as we worked through not having five football players,” noted Bartelink. “Missing those five players for the first five weeks of our season has made it tough to practice and play to what I think this team’s true identity will be. During our summer off-season program, we demonstrated that we can play at a high pace on offense and fly around and create havoc on defense; that is harder to do with a smaller roster.”
Taking on the Bullfrogs in the opener, Bartelink said it was good to come away with the victory, plus get two out of three on the night.
“We were a bit sloppy in this game, but played with good effort. After a slow start, we eventually built a double-digit lead that we maintained throughout the game,” he explained. “Our rebounding effort is what won the game for us, specifically our offensive rebounding. Frank Richard Barrera and Ben Fletcher controlled the offensive glass, each with a monster double-double, and created a lot of second chance shots for us. Their pursuit of the basketball that night was impressive.”
Despite the occasional miscues, Bartelink said he anticipates those will smooth out with more time in game situations.
“All things considered, we were satisfied with the win. We had good offensive balance with four players scoring at least nine points. We know we have to play better as the competition starts to stiffen up. We identified things on film that we feel we can improve upon in the short term,” he said.
Thursday, Nov. 30, the squads were on the road to play at Buhach Colony.
The freshmen took a loss but the JV won by a 47-34 final, getting a nice bounce back win after the tough loss on Monday.
The varsity got its second win, defeating the host Thunder by a final of 82-41, setting the stage early with a 21-5 scoring edge in the first quarter and opened it up, 50-18 at half.
Frank Richard Barrera poured in a varsity career high 22 points and had nine rebounds. Ben Fletcher added his varsity career high with 22 points, and dished out six assists. It was a varsity career high 16 points for Cam Dalpogetti and he also had four rebounds, four steals, and hit four three-pointers on the night. Daniel Gonzales had 13 points, seven rebounds; Ben Ferreira had seven points, five rebounds, eight assists and seven steals.
“We went into this game with only seven of our players in uniform. Besides missing the five football players, we were missing three other players, including Ethan Garza who was held out with a wrist injury,” explained Bartelink. “Going into a game with seven players is not a comfortable feeling. The message to the team is that through adversity comes opportunity. It was a tremendous opportunity for them to go out and potentially earn more of a significant early season role once our roster gets to full strength. They more than responded to the challenge. We knew the group we had was good enough to win the game, but they exceeded any expectations we had in terms of the result on the scoreboard.”
The coach said his team came out with high level energy, effort and focus.
“We jumped on Buhach immediately and never looked back. We found high quality shots and displayed elite shot making,” Bartelink said.
The team as a whole shot 62 percent from the field throughout the game and the defense played well. Barrera made his first 10 shots and finished 10-for-11 from the field. Fletcher got almost any shot he wanted; he didn’t settle, and had several nice finishes around the rim. Dalpogetti was hot from behind the arc, making four of five from deep.
“Daniel Gonzalez was very active on defense and productive on offense. Ben Ferreira played really well and filled up the stat sheet,” added the coach. “Three of our five players established new varsity career highs in points, while two others finished with scoring outputs just below their career highs. Having the entire starting line-up play that well at the same time was fun to watch. We’ve seen all of these players play really well in the past, but never all in the same game. I could not have been prouder of the group that played that night.”
Games on the schedule as the preseason continues were to include Modesto at home on Tuesday, Dec. 5; at Orestimba on Dec. 6, facing the team that knocked them out of the playoffs last year and then home to host Sutter on Friday, Dec. 8.
“We’re excited to welcome back our five football players. It’ll take some time getting them up to speed on things, but one thing I do know is that they’ll go out and compete at an extremely high level,” Bartelink said.
