Prep basketball: Live Oak earns first win of season despite sloppy fourth

Live Oak survived a sloppy fourth quarter to pullout its first win of the season, a 46-36 decision over Andrew Hill Monday at home.
The Acorns (1-3) came together after a heartbreaking loss at Gonzales Friday, where they couldn’t capitalize on a technical foul down by 1 with three seconds left.
In that game, Tanner Howard missed a 3-pointer that would have given the Acorns the win. He made up for it in a big way on Monday.
“He missed a wide open 3 against Gonzales and he was down, but I told him after the game, ‘you’re going to get another opportunity. You’re going to get several opportunities. Shake it off, don’t worry about it.’ So I was really happy to see that tonight,” said coach Brett Paolucci.
He had a respectable nine points, but none were bigger than a 3-pointer with little more than a minute to play.
That shot made the score a two-possession game and provided the cushion the Acorns needed to clinch the victory after nearly giving up a nine-point lead to start the fourth quarter.
“I think we just got too comfortable,” Paolucci said. “God, it was sloppy. It was sloppy in the fourth quarter and we made certain decisions that allowed them to stay in the ball game and they took advantage of that.”
Luke Laguna followed Howard’s 3 with a pair of clutch free throws that put Live Oak up by three scores.
Laguna led both teams with 24 points, his best output thus far this season.
The Acorns’ defense proved solid for the night, as Live Oak won three out of the four quarters and tied in the other. That allowed the Acorns to take a four-point margin after the first quarter to a nine-point margin at half and the ultimate 10-point margin that won the game.
However, in the fourth quarter, when Andrew Hill was pressing in hopes of stealing the game, Paolucci said his boys weren’t able to break the press and score easy baskets.
“When teams get desperate and they start full court pressing you, you have to take advantage of that,” Paolucci said. “For that little stretch we didn’t take advantage. We got to learn.”
Laguna dominated the first half, nearly equaling Hill’s two-quarter output by himself, scoring 13 points to the Falcons’ 15.
Hill had one player in double figures. Shawn Sipanya led the Falcons with 11 points, including seven in the fourth quarter.
Andrew Hill in the early going, tried to play with a true center, which worked as Emmanuel Egbe pulled down five first half rebounds. However, he also pulled down four first half fouls and was pulled with about 2 minutes left in the half. We returned in the third quarter, but with 1:43 to play, he was whistled for his fifth foul.
Paolucci said his loss helped underneath the basket, but it mainly allowed Hill to go small and it added speed to the Falcons’ offense.
“It concerned me because it made them faster, because they had little fast guys in there,” Paolucci said. “I was still very concerned. Yeah it took the post presence out, but they had a guy in there who was more athletic and faster.”
The Acorns, however, managed to keep the Falcons’ shooters at bay while going on three key scoring runs to open up a lead.
In the first, it was an 11-3 run after spotting Hill the first four points. Live Oak followed that with an 11-4 run in the second that led to a 9-2 run to start the third.
Those proved crucial as Hill capitalized on Live Oak committing eight turnovers in the fourth quarter to nearly erase a nine-point deficit.
After Hill pulled the game to three at 39-36 following a pair of free throws, Howard hit the 3-pointer to make it a six-point game.
After Laguna’s pair of free throws, Brandon Balala sank a pair of free throws to push the game to its final margin.
Balala had five points in the win, with Pat McLaughlin adding six of his won.
Josh Cavalho led the team in rebounding with eight, followed by six from Laguna.
Live Oak will return to the home court 7 p.m. Thursday to take on Yerba Buena.