The San Benito boys and girls basketball teams will be sailing
their ships into uncharted waters in the Central Coast Section
Division 1 finals today.
The San Benito boys and girls basketball teams will be sailing their ships into uncharted waters in the Central Coast Section Division 1 finals today.
There was just one other San Benito basketball team team to make it to the semifinals. That was in 1998 when the boys lost to St. Ignatius, 69-44.
After an already strong season, the Balers are looking for two more wins for a little icing on the cake.
But winning a CCS title, especially for the boys team, will be a monumental task against the best teams in the area.
The fifth-seeded boys team will be playing No. 1 Piedmont Hills at Santa Clara High tonight in the first game of the San Benito double header.
If the game doesn’t go longer than an hour and a half, fans should still be able to make the trip back across Highway 85 to Leland High, where the third-seeded San Benito girls team takes on No. 2 Salinas.
The commute is about 20 minutes from school to school, and anyone who attends shouldn’t miss the second game.
Piedmont Hills lost 52-51 at Live Oak earlier in the season. The only other loss was a 62-48 loss at Pioneer.
Although the Balers haven’t played Pioneer this year, they have played TCAL rival Live Oak.
San Benito opened up its league schedule with a 48-36 loss at Live Oak, but ever since then, the Balers have been unstoppable. They have won ten in a row, including a 51-44 win over Live Oak the second time around.
On Saturday, the Balers pulled off what could be called an upset against Menlo-Atherton in the quarterfinals.
Piedmont Hills dispatched Alisal 65-54 in the quarterfinals. Last year, the Pirates went 27-1, losing their only game in the CCS Division 1 championship.
If the Balers are to finish their season with an almost unprecedented 12-game win streak, they will have to sink the Pirates ship in the semifinals and then either crack the No. 2 Bellarmine Bells or trounce the No. 3 Milpitas Trojans.
Much of the success this year has come from Baler big men Anthony Butler and Kyle Sharp. Butler dominates in the post, and Sharp, the TCAL MVP, can shoot from almost anywhere. Therir presence has continually opened up room for the guards to get good shots off.
Sharp and Butler will again be the key for the Balers if they are to win.
“We just have to keep playing the way we have been playing and make other teams adjust to us,” said Baler coach David Kaplansky.
The Balers will have to find a way to stop junior First Team selection Ryan Cooper.
“We’re going to deny him the basketball, and make it tough for him to get any good looks at the basket,” Kaplansky said. “They have a similar team to Seaside as far as the pressure goes. We feel like we have the advantage in the post, so we are going to keep attacking there. If we continue to get balanced scoring, we have a chance to win.”
The San Benito girls team will have to find a way to defeat Salinas, who has won the first two matchups.
In the first game in Hollister, Salinas got into some serious foul trouble but still won 63-54 behind Rebekah Fales’ 27 points.
The second game at Salinas was much tighter. But Rebekah and her sister Angela combined for 27 points in the 39-34 win. San Benito was up nine points at one time but couldn’t handle the Salinas pressure.
Coach Tom Dean, who tries to play everyone in every game, is confident that a tighter rotation will lead his team to victory.
If the Balers can win, they will play either No. 1 Alisal or No. 5 Gilroy, who surprised No. 4 Piedmont Hills 43-42 Saturday.
The San Benito basketball teams are hoping the season will not end tonight. There may be just enough wind left to fill their sails.
