Brea Olinda has too much power for Santa Rosa, 66-44
Santa Rosa coach Tom Crunk instructs his players during a timeout Wednesday. (Photo by Rick Rowell) By Paige Mendez, Correspondent The S...
By Paige Mendez, Correspondent
The Santa Rosa Academy boys basketball team finished their season with a 66-44 loss to Brea Olinda at home in the first round of the CIF playoffs Wednesday night.
Brea Olinda started the game with a 9-2 run and held the Rangers to just two buckets in the first quarter, while they put up 19 points of their own.
The following two quarters brought more buckets for Santa Rosa. However, the Wildcats held up that scoring lead, for the most part, with a 44-15 score at half and a 61-34 lead going into the last eight minutes of game time.
That last quarter would end up being the Rangers’ biggest, with 22 points being scored -- as much as the first three quarters combined. Meanwhile, Brea Olinda only got eight shots to drop in the fourth.
Even with a late rally, Santa Rosa didn’t quite have enough to take over and ended on the losing side.
Despite the wide score margin, the two teams were fairly evenly matched in steals and blocks and offensive rebounding. The difference, it seems, was in the defensive boards and overall field goal percentage.
Offensively, the Wildcats outrebounded the Rangers 27-18, even though Santa Rosa claims the leading rebounder on the night -- AJ Hopkins, who had 6 defensive rebounds of 7 total.
Hopkins, not surprisingly, was one of the only Rangers who was near-evenly matched to the height of Brea Olinda’s big team, which has four seniors standing over 6 feet tall.
“I knew I was going to have to use my size,” Hopkins said. “I just wanted to go out there and play my best and do it for the potentially last game with the seniors.”
The last quarter’s score showed just how badly the rest of the team wanted to do the same as Hopkins, and give their seniors all they had.
Head coach Tom Crunk said that part of his job is always bittersweet.
“You want to make sure the team isn’t too down on themselves because next year is always going to get better and better, but there’s four guys in there who won’t be here next year,” he said. “It’s bittersweet, but I want them to know that whatever is in store for them will be even better than what will happen here.”
As for the returning nine players for next year, there’s excitement to see how far they can go.
“We never give up and we always work hard no matter what,” said junior Chris Jones, who put up a game-leading 18 points on the night. “And I’m happy for what we’ll be next year. I think this shows that we’ll be really good.”
Austyn Hopkins puts in two points for the Rangers on Wednesday. (Photo by Rick Rowell)
