Varsity Boys Hoops Falls to San Juan 61-48, Finishes 2-2 at Holiday Classic with Huge Home Game Tonight Against Serra

The Dons (6-7, 469th in CA) came in to the Consolation Championship Saturday evening in San Diego against a much higher ranked San Juan Hills team (11-8, 150th in CA) that had lost their first game to Monte Vista by 1 and also won two in a row.

First quarter started with both teams trading “punches” back and forth with the Dons trailing 15-14. San Juan started to pull away a bit late in the second quarter and were up 30-22 at the break. Liam Krackeler had 8 points and Maddox Malm 6, both with two three’s.

The Dons only really had two bad quarters the whole tournament, both third quarters in their two losses, and San Juan came out firing hitting three from deep plus three buckets from their big man #55 Hodges inside to put them up 46-28 at one point. The deficit was 15 at the end of the third.

The Dons made another charge early in the fourth with Gavin Dodge getting two buckets inside and Liam and Maddox both adding another three to cut the lead to 7 at 50-43. The Dons were quickly running out of time and allowed two buckets inside that were just too hard to recover from. We started fouling with about a minute left to extend the game but with the new foul shot rules (no more one and one) it is tough to make up ground. The final was 61-48 San Juan.

Dons shot 33% from the field overall, 9/25 (36%) on 2FG, 8/26 (31%) on 3FG and 6/8 (75%) from FT. San Juan was 44% from the field, 16/27 (59%) from 2FG, 8/27 (30%) on 3FG, and 5/9 (56%) from FT. Clearly the 59% from 2 sticks out as does the 40-21 rebounding discrepancy for the Dons. We also lost points in the paint by 12 as the big man Hodges #55 had 20 points and 11 boards. They had a very nice backscreen play for him on the blocks that they ran on the first play of the game and many times thereafter. #12 added 16 points and #5 added 15 for San Juan.

Maddox led the way for the Dons with 17 points, 3 three’s, 3 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 steal, and 1 block in 28 turnover free minutes. Liam had 11 points, 3 three’s, 2 rebounds, 2 deflections and 1 assist in 26 turnover free minutes. Gavin added 9 points, 5 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 deflection and only 1 turnover in 29 minutes. Jordan Brown had to sit this one out with a hip contusion from his legendary loose ball dive against Vista but hopes to be back tonight.

HUUUUGGGGEEEE game against Serra tonight (7-2, 19th in SF metro, 90th in CA) at home at 7pm. The Holiday Classic was a success overall as the Dons have moved up 9 spots in the rankings to 87th in SF Metro and 78 spots in the CA rankings to 391st.

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