Despite an extremely undermanned lineup due to injury, the Dos Pueblos High boys’ basketball team hung tough with first-place Santa Barbara for a half, but the Dons found their stride in the second half and pulled away for a 74-59 victory.
Injuries to three key contributors, including Wyatt Gardiner, Jordan Caratachea, and Iyad Ahmad-Reda, have derailed a promising Dos Pueblos season, but that did not stop the Chargers from giving an all-out effort.
“It’s a crosstown rivalry. You want the kids to step up—that’s one of the things that we put on the board, and I felt that they did,” said Dos Pueblos coach Joe Zamora. “They battled. It was fun to watch them. They did a good job defensively, they were cohesive and together on defense, and on offense they were finding each other.”
Santa Barbara outscored Dos Pueblos 22-8 in the first quarter, but the Chargers responded with an inspired second quarter, outscoring Santa Barbara 28-12. Coulter Jay knocked down a three-pointer at the buzzer to put the Chargers ahead 36-34 at halftime.
“We came out full bore and then we let off the gas. You can’t do that against a good team,” said Santa Barbara High coach Greg Zuffelato. “They are decimated with injuries, but they still have very good players.”
Jay scored 15 of his team-high 22 points in the second quarter, including three three-pointers. Slowing him down was the key to Santa Barbara’s resurgence in the second half.
“We were talking at halftime about who was going to step up and stop him,” said Zuffelato of Jay. “He was just unstoppable. He was playing so hard.”
The Dons wrestled away control of the game behind a huge second half from Levi Oakes. He finished with 27 points and seven rebounds. Owen Horn added 19 points and five assists as Santa Barbara outscored Dos Pueblos 40-23 after the break.
“They are bigger, and they have a hard time containing our guards, so the message was attack, attack, attack,” Zuffelato said. “Owen did it some in the first half, but Levi decided he was going to do it every time, so we started running actions for him to get isolated.”
Horn tossed an alley-oop to Blake Lee with 4:56 remaining in the fourth quarter that resulted in a thunderous slam and increased the Santa Barbara lead to 65-48. Lee was assessed a technical foul on the play for hanging on the rim.
A three-pointer by Oakes put the Dons ahead 72-52 with 3:15 remaining.
With the victory, Santa Barbara improves to 16-8 overall and 10-1 in Channel League play. Dos Pueblos dropped to 12-13 overall and 3-8 in Channel League play.
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