Varsity boys basketball against Austin High game report

The varsity boys basketball team continued to dominate District play on Jan. 15, against Austin High with a 73-49 win. It moved the team to a 19-2 overall record and a perfect 8-0 District record.

“The good thing about it was that everyone got to play, and we shot the ball well,” varsity head coach Robert Lucero said. “After the first quarter, we were able to go to the free-throw line to stretch out the lead. They hit a couple shots in the first quarter, but after that we did a better job of staying attached to their shooters when they were coming off screens. Overall, I thought defensively we had a pretty good game, and that really helped our offense.”

It was an impressive win to close out the first half of the District season without a loss, and Lucero hopes this strong form continues into the second half of the season.

“What it means is that we’ve done a good job in round one, and we are going into District games with the right attitude,” Lucero said. “We look at the bad things we did [each game] and the good things we did. We have our full team again, with [freshman] Brock [Cunningham] coming back, so our practices have been a lot better. We’re still trying to figure out some roles, but our depth has been really good, so as long as we work hard every day, we’ll be able to have different styles of play.”

The Chaps will try to continue this high level of play throughout the rest of District and into the playoffs. Lucero insisted that they are trying not to get too far ahead of themselves; however, with their ever increasing lead in District standings, a playoff berth looks highly probable.

“We can still get better,” Lucero said. “We’ve seen a bunch of different styles of basketball, so hopefully we’ll be able to match up against different styles — that’s our goal. We need to play with energy and excitement as opposed to, ‘oh the basketball season is dragging on.’ That’s the key for us.”