The San Benito Lady ‘Balers seem to be enjoying their
newly-installed, ultra-aggressive form of basketball, but after a
60-13 win on Saturday, who wouldn’t be?
HOLLISTER
The San Benito Lady ‘Balers seem to be enjoying their newly-installed, ultra-aggressive form of basketball, but after a 60-13 win on Saturday, who wouldn’t be?
San Benito (1-0) throttled a visiting Soledad (0-2) team at Mattson Gym last weekend, winning by a 47-point margin in their first game of the season.
Jumping out to a 28-1 lead after one quarter and forcing a whopping 40 turnovers through four quarters, San Benito closed the door shut on Soledad mere minutes into the game.
The Lady ‘Balers had 10 different scorers Saturday, with Vanessa Farias leading the way with 16 points and seven steals. Elena Fata had 10 points behind a pair of treys and added five steals. Courtney Cabrera led the team with eight rebounds.
San Benito used an intense, up-close-and-personal defense that created plenty of turnovers and allowed them to get out and run with a fast-paced transition game.
“This is what we’ll do,” said first-year coach David Kaplansky. “We didn’t have a lot of turnovers and we didn’t play down to their level. There wasn’t much of a dropoff from the two groups we rotated in. Both were consistent and I enjoyed seeing the balance of scoring.”
While Soledad is by no means a powerhouse basketball team (their previous game was a 51-14 loss to Monterey), Kaplansky was pleased to see the season-opener progress the way it did.
And the team seems to be on the same page as well.
“It’s more intense and we can feel the vibe from our coaches,” said Kelsey Russell, who had six points and nine steals Saturday. “I like it a lot and I feel more energized and ready to go … We should be better than last year. It’ll still be hard though.”
San Benito’s stifling defense held Soledad to just a single point in the first quarter, when the Aztecs converted on 1 of 2 free throws with just 10.9 seconds remaining.
In the second, it was much of the same, as the Lady ‘Balers opened up a 43-9 halftime lead.
“This is way more up-tempo,” Farias said. “I feel this year we have more of a system. Everyone gets to touch the ball more.”
San Benito was constantly changing defenses on Soledad, and opened the game with a full-court press that led to a slew of steals and a sizable lead.
“I think our full-court press really took them out of their game early,” Kaplansky said. “This was a good first game. We played hard. We played our brand of basketball.”
San Benito’s greatest margin of victory last season was 15 points.
The Lady ‘Balers will hit the road for a game at King City Saturday at 2 p.m.
“We have a long way to go,” the coach added, “but for a first game, I was proud that they were understanding the philosophy.”
1 2 3 4 F
Soledad 1 8 2 2 13
San Benito 28 15 12 5 60
San Benito
Ademek 4-8 0-0 8, Farias 7-12 2-6 16, Fata 1-3 2-2 10, Aguilera 3-6 1-2 7, Russell 3-5 0-0 6, Cabrera 3-6 0-0 6, Soza 1-7 0-0 2, Guerrero 0-1 1-2 1, Casalegno 0-2 2-4 2, O’Brien 1-2 0-0 2.
Three-point goals – Fata 2.
JV Note: The San Benito girls junior varsity basketball team thumped Soledad 46-6 Saturday behind eight points a piece from Kim Warner and Arielle Rianda.
It was a a solid team effort for San Benito, and coach Karen Fortino and coach Skow were pleased with the team’s first win of the season.
Melisah Cortez, Elyssa Verzosa and Danielle Acosta all had six points each.
“We are looking forward to a great season,” Fortino said following Saturday’s victory. “We have an awesome group of girls.”
San Benito will play at King City Saturday at 12:30 p.m.
