Milpitas High School came back from a 12-point defecit in the
second half to edge the Bulldogs 57-54 Thursday night at Sobrato
High School.
Milpitas High School came back from a 12-point defecit in the second half to edge the Bulldogs 57-54 Thursday night at Sobrato High School.
The Bulldogs inbounded the ball to forward Ryan Williams with four seconds remaining in the game for one last shot that came up short as the boys team lost its fourth consecutive game this season.
Sobrato went into halftime with a comfortable 26-14 lead but saw it diminish when Milpitas went on a 6-0 run to tie the game at 35-35 with 50 seconds remaining in the third quarter.
The Trojans then scored seven unanswered points to eventually take the lead with a little over five minutes left in the game.
They would never look back after that.
The Bulldogs accumulated six turnovers in the fourth quarter to help the Trojans come back.
Milpitas guard Edric Egberuare had four steals in the game, with three coming in the second half.
He also led the Trojans in scoring with 13 points and three assists.
Though both teams managed to put big numbers on the scoreboard Thursday night, they still missed a lot of shots.
The Trojans were 19 of 32 from field goal range while Sobrato was 16 for 30. Sobrato started the game strong, jumping out to a 6-0 lead and held Milpitas scoreless for the first 3:12 of the game.
The Bulldog offense was led by guard KodI Billerbeck who scored a game-high 14 points, including two three-point field goals.
Billerbeck also had five assists.
Sobrato was also led by guard Mark Garma with 11 points three assists.
The two big men, Tom Buich and Charlie Bynum had four points each while Bynum had a game-high seven rebounds.
Sobrato coach said his team became too comfortable with their 12-point halftime lead and let the lead slip away.
“Milpitas played with heart,” Crawford said. “After halftime, they didn’t didn’t look at the scoreboard and say the game was over. They said look out we’re coming after you. They came after us, we didn’t respond. We didn’t respond to the pressure. Some kids tried to sack up but we didn’t have a unified effort. They wanted it more than we did. It sounds cliche but thats the truth.”
The Bulldogs missed several defensive rebounds in the fourth quarter and it turned into three three-point field goals from the Trojans to seal the victory.
Forward Charlie Bynum said his team has been in the habit of letting games slip away this season.
“We didn’t finish in the third quarter quarter,” said Bynum. “We were up by 12 at the half and we weren’t making shots. We always start strong but we never finish.”
Thursday night’s loss lowers the Bulldog’s record to 3-6, they will try to end their losing streak at the Yuba City Tournament at Yuba City High School starting Thursday afternoon and will run through the weekend.
Crawford said that if his team wants to start winning, they need to fight for that first win. “We’re going to be coming in on a four game losing streak, which is a tough thing to do,” Crawford said. “We’re going to have the opportunity to see what kind of heart we have. We can go south or north, going north is a heck of an uphill climb. We can go south and roll down the hill. If we want to go north we have to fight and climb our way to the top and that’s what’s going to have to happen.”
