San Benito, after being up 21-20 at halftime, routs Seaside in
the third and fourth quarters in a 67-37 win on Tuesday night
HOLLISTER
The first half of Tuesday night’s boys basketball game showcased both the good and the bad for the San Benito Haybalers, but preceded a second half that was anything but ugly.
After a streaky first-half battle between both the ‘Balers and visiting Seaside Tuesday at Hollister’s Mattson Gym, a half that saw the ‘Balers ahead just 21-20 at the break, San Benito blew the game open in the third and fourth quarters and outscored the Spartans 46-17 en route to a 67-37 win.
But streaky and inconsistent play plagued the ‘Balers in the first half.
“It was more like they were stepping up,” San Benito head coach John Becerra said of the first half. “Once we got out to a bit of a lead, we think it’s gonna be easy and we mentally relax. Sometimes that happens, you relax a little bit and the other team steps up.”
Perhaps sparked by the last-second heroics of Cooper Sepulveda, whose 3-pointer at the buzzer provided the junior varsity team with a rousing 42-41 victory earlier in the evening, the varsity Haybalers opened their game on fire and jumped out to a 13-2 lead to start.
Before it got any more out of hand, though, the Spartans (1-6) charged right back into the mix, cutting the deficit to 13-7 at the end of the first quarter and eventually taking a 16-15 lead at one point in the second.
“They would step up a little bit and then we would have to answer back,” said post player Dominic Zanella, who led the ‘Balers with 18 points behind 9 of 11 shooting from the field. “We just had to adapt to it. But we shouldn’t let that affect us and how we play.”
Zanella also pulled down eight boards.
“They were just running their offense better, and that hurt us in the second quarter,” said Becerra of Seaside, which was 5 of 10 from the field in the second period. “In the first half, they were trying to go one-on-one, penetrate and play it up. But then they began to run their real offense and it kind of hurt.
“At halftime, we told them exactly what they were doing and I thought we adjusted.”
The ‘Balers, which shot 21 of 37 from the field in the second half, didn’t begin to pull away from Seaside until midway through the third quarter.
Led by Kyle Vallejo, who scored 11 of his 15 points in the third quarter alone, San Benito called timeout with a 36-31 lead and three minutes and 52 seconds remaining.
They took a 46-33 lead to the fourth quarter.
“At points of the game, they were starting to step up more and stop us when we tried to run our plays,” Zanella said. “Other times we would catch them off guard on defense and get the breakaway pass.”
Points off turnovers was the name of the game for San Benito in the fourth quarter. The ‘Balers forced 15 second-half turnovers, seven in the fourth, which led to its impressive 10 of 14 field goal percentage in the final period.
San Benito outscored the Spartans 21-4 in the fourth.
Jason Canchola had nine points, Eric Elayda had nine points and four assists and Tim Von Urff had four points, four assists and three steals for San Benito.
“We went through a spurt there where we were going too quick,” Becerra said. “Tonight, I thought it was great that we were able to slow down and get back in control of our offense. That was a big step.”
San Benito will host Watsonville on Saturday. The ‘Balers already routed the Wildcatz 75-23 earlier this season at the Seascape Classic in Aptos.
Tip-off is at 7 p.m.
Note:
San Benito shot 31 of 60 (52 percent) from the field, 2 of 5 from the line … Seaside shot 14 of 44 (32 percent) from the field and 6 of 12 from the stripe … The ‘Balers committed 12 turnovers in the game, but just four in the second half … The Spartans committed 27 turnovers in the game.
TEAM 1 2 3 4 F
SEA 7 13 13 4 37
SAN 13 8 25 21 67
San Benito (67) – Alves 1-1 0-0 2, Canchola 4-9 0-0 9, Elayda 4-10 0-0 9, Gillies 1-3 0-0 2, Rickard 1-2 2-2 4, Von Urff 2-5 0-0 4, Vallejo 7-16 0-1 15, Zanella 9-11 0-2 18, Hunt 2-2 0-0 4.
Three-point goals – Canchola 1, Elayda 1, Vallejo 1.
JV Note:
The San Benito junior varsity team didn’t appear to have much of a chance late in the game Tuesday against the visiting Seaside Spartans at Hollister’s Mattson Gym.
Trailing by six points with 8.7 seconds remaining, the ‘Balers forced two turnovers and scored two field goals to somehow cut Seaside’s lead to two with 1.5 ticks left.
On an inbounds pass from Haybaler Jeremy Canchola, Cooper Sepulveda came off a high screen from teammate Gerson Flores-Ibarra and drained a 3-pointer as time expired, sending San Benito to an improbable 42-41 victory.
Sepulveda finished with 20 points on the night.
