Turnovers fuel Wildcats’ win over Calipatria
BRAWLEY — Don’t look now, but here comes Brawley. A week ago at this time the Brawley Union boys’ basketball team had a record of 1-5 — a record that included uneven losses against Palm Desert, Shadow Hills and Indio.
They were clearly a team in transition, having lost all five of their starters and their head coach from the squad that won back-to-back Imperial Valley League crowns in 2017 and 2018, and it was more than fair to wonder how fast they’d be able to turn it around.
As it happens, the answer appears to be: pretty darn.
After their complete, 59-36, unspooling of the Calipatria Hornets last night, the Wildcats now have an overall record of 5-6 — having gone 4-1 since their loss to Indio.
What seems to have keyed this turnaround — and what made the difference in their game against the Hornets — is next-level defensive intensity.
Against Calipatria, Brawley seemed to have adopted a mantra of “touch every ball”.
It didn’t matter whether they were sitting in a 2-3 zone, a 1-3-1, or using full-court man-to-man, they were going to get their mitts on the ball come hell or high water.
That aggression didn’t quite pay off in the first quarter.
Both teams started out pushing the pace, but the Hornets’ first gear had a little more oomph than Brawley’s.
Hugo Cervantes poured in 10 first-quarter points for Calipat, filling the lane on herky-jerky dribble-drives and swishing a corner three with a hand in his face, and matching the scoring output of the Wildcats as a team.
Fortunately for the Wildcats, the Hornets managed only three non-Cervantes points (two of which were actually Cervantes points — Oscar Cervantes points), leaving it 13-10 after one.
But anybody looking for a back-and-forth affair, perhaps with some virtuoso isolation buckets, was destined to be disappointed.
The Wildcats started to make their move in the second quarter.
They walled Hugo Cervantes out of the game (he scored two more points in the quarter and nothing afterward), worked the gear-shift on defense and grabbed all of the junkyard dog baskets they could get, going into halftime with a 24-22 lead.
Brawley opened third quarter with a Jessie Gutierrez layup. Then Matt Ortiz snatched the ball immediately after it was inbounded and got a layup of his own from the exact spot Gutierrez had. That opened up the floodgates.
The Wildcats got steal after steal — hoovering up desperation passes, slapping the ball out of opponents’ hands, wrestling for it on the ground … the works.
This “eyes-on-the-prize” mentality translated itself well into gang rebounding. Brawley seemed to average at least two shots per possession and buried the Hornets with extra shots.
Toward the end of the quarter, the Calipatria side started exhibiting signs of mental and physical fatigue. They didn’t move to the ball or do much to stop the Wildcats from moving with it, and Brawley cruised to the W.
Charles Smith was a monster out there, coming
close to a points-steals double-double at 17 and eight (adding six rebounds for good measure).
Joining him on the active-hands brigade were Oscar Gonzalez (11 points, five assists, four steals) and Nico Castro (10 points, six rebounds, four swipes).
Speaking after the game Coach Robert Christensen expressed pleasure with his team’s recent uptick in performance, crediting “going back to the basics on defense” and “having our defense being our offense” as being something he’s tried to re-emphasize.
“It was nice to see us play together as a team (against Calipatria),” he said, “We set the defensive tone, and it allowed for some good buckets in the second.”
Overall, he said, the team is “still a work in progress — every game’s still different, trying to figure out perfect rotation,” but he’s seeing positive signs.
Both Brawley and Calipatria are in for a bit of a respite, neither has any games scheduled until after Christmas, with the Wildcats playing Dec. 26 against Rancho Mirage at their Holiday Invitational and Calipatria playing Dec. 28 against Pacifica Christian.