By JEREMY SELLEW
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There’s no doubt there were emotions involved when Frazier visited California in a Section 4-2A boys basketball game Friday night.
Frazier head coach Zach Keefer is the defensive coordinator for the Trojans during football season, so there’s some familiarity there and he knew he’d take some of his football players’ best shot on the court.
The Commodores, in the meantime, picked a bad time to play their worst first half of the season.
The Trojans took control early and built a 22-point halftime lead before surviving a Commodores’ late push to hold on for a 53-43 win. The move vaults California to the top of the section standings.
“We just couldn’t have started any worse,” Keefer said following the game. “California’s a good team and we couldn’t hit anything early on. I was really happy with the effort in the second half, but you’re not going to win many games only scoring 11 points in a half.”
California did a fantastic job creating problems for Frazier’s offense by using their length to clog up passing lanes and crashing the boards.
“The length wasn’t what we were counting on, to be honest,” California coach Aaron Balla said. “But it’s looking like it’s something we can count on now.
“We really controlled the boards in the first half and we did a good job of getting a hand on a lot of shots. We knew they are very good in their set offense and it starts getting into the high post. The kids prepared for it yesterday in practice and did a great job carrying that into the game.”
The Commodores went scoreless for nearly an entire quarter, 7:50 to be exact between the first and second frames.
During that time, California was hot from the field and rolled out to a 21-0 run. Payton Conte scored 11 of his 15 points in the outburst.
“We couldn’t hit anything and it was like everything they threw up there was going in,” Keefer said. “Not that they didn’t have some good shots. We just couldn’t get anything to fall. Conte and (Corey Frick) were really good inside and used their length against us well.”
The run continued as the Trojans (2-1, 2-0) built a 19-4 lead after the first quarter and ran it up to 31-8 before the Commodores hit their first field goal in nearly 10 minutes.
Nathan O’Savage hit a bucket in the final seconds of the half to make it 33-11 at the break.
O’Savage scored a game-high 19 points in the win.
“We’re only three games into the season, but we’ve started out slow in the first and second quarters in the first couple games,” Balla said. “Jumping out to that big lead was important for us. We want to see four quarters out of our guys each night.”
In the second half, Frazier was able to rally and cut the lead under 10 on a couple occasions.
Owen Newcomer scored his first points of the game in the third quarter as the Commodores won the frame by a margin of 16-10, but still found themselves down 43-27 at the end of the third.
“I knew these guys would continue to fight and claw back. That’s what they do,” Keefer said. “The lead just got too high and we tried our best to cut it down.”
Frazier, usually a potent team from behind the arc, didn’t hit its first 3-pointer until Luke Santo hit one with 6:40 to go in the game.
The Commodores (6-3, 3-1) added two more in the frame but never pulled closer than nine points.
“I was really disappointed with how we controlled the ball in the second half,” Balla said. “I already have some ideas of some things we can do differently to simulate similar situations. We had a couple of guys take some bad shots when we needed to find the nearest white shot and pull the ball out. Again, it’s only the third game and these guys have already put in a lot of work and are really learning the system.”
California will be back in action Tuesday when they host Monessen. The Commodores, who have played the last four games without senior Kenny Fine, host Beth-Center Monday in a nonsection game. Fine is out with an ankle injury.
“I think this is a game we missed Kenny, but I’m not making excuses,” Keefer said. “California was up for this one and they played well, better than us. But we’ll see them again and our guys know that.”