dos pueblos v. san marcos

SoCal High School & Prep Report

Fight Night: Dos Pueblos Wins Over San
Marcos 68-57--(January 29, 1998)

Most of Dos Pueblos' games this season have been real cliff-hangers, and Shantay Legans has been required to play Indiana Jones, Luke Skywalker and Rambo all rolled into one, doing his usual last minute heroics to save the game. But unlike those prior games, which have come down to the wire, yesterday's game against San Marcos at San Marcos was calm by comparison. At least at the end.

But in between the start and the finish of the game, there was more than a little excitement, including a fist fight which broke out, causing San Marcos' leading scorer and rebounder to get thrown out of the game, all but assuring a DP win.

As usual, we had a correspondent at the game. . . actually he was in the game. Here's what Shantay Legans had to say about yesterday's win over San Marcos:

Well, the whole team was ready for this game. Our big men played GREAT - Alex Jenkins had 23 points, Dan Hoefer made our first points, Zach Bruce did spme nice work and most of all Kapena O'Neal was slugged in his privates by their big man Brook Billings and got him ejected from the game. Dave Sears, Ryan Holbrook and Jeremy Archuleta our other guards did good too. In the first quarter Coach subbed all the starters out and put in the bench cuz we were sucking and the bench made 8 points.

Well, taking us out got our attention and we took care of biz from then on. Brook Billings from San Marcos was killing us on the boards and the game was a cruise once he got ejected. I worked their point guard Randy Moharran, he had 3 fouls and had to sit down in the 2nd quarter until the 4th. I only had 14 points and 6 assists and 2 steals. I only took 9 shots and had 3 3's, but that's the Coach's plan - I only take over when the rest of the team is not doing good and keep them in the game. It was a good win and we are 9-0 in league now. Let's keep working guys!

Legans

Jenkins scored 14 of his 23 points in the second half as Dos Pueblos broke open what had been a very tight game in the opening minutes of the fourth period. Phil Sherman wanted to avoid the high anxiety that he's been feeling at the end of almost every game this season, and so he pulled the starters which got their attention.

With the win, Dos Pueblos improved to 9-0 in league and 18-2 overall.

``The kids played great defense,'' Phil Sherman told the New-Press. DP has won four of its recent league games by a single basket. He was looking to avoid that yesterday.

San Marcos, 7-2 and 16-4, gave the Chargers a run for the money despite stumbling out of the blocks.

San Marcos trailed 12-0 after five minutes in the first quarter, but then came back to take a 37-33 lead in the second half on a powerful move through traffic and dunk by Brook Billings. And as Shantey noted in his commentary above, DP was more than a bit concerned about Billings. Jenkins, for one, was concerned.

"It brought back some memories of our last game with them (where the Chargers blew a 19-point lead and had to survive a missed shot to win), he told the Santa Barbara News Press. "We were just sitting around at the end."

Jenkins and the rest of the DP team weren't going to let that happen again. Ryan Holbrook hit a basket off an assist by David Sears. Billings came right back and scored, but then Jenkins replied, hitting a driving six-foot leaning bank shot, tying the game up against at 39-39 with his own drive into the lane.

This time it was Jenkins who was the start, and not Shantey. Before the half, Jenkins added a free throw and Sears buried a 3-pointer at the buzzer to end the quarter.

In the fourth quarter, Shantay stole the ball and drove the length of the court for a layup to get things rolling again. Sears was fouled and quickly hit two from the line. Billings was then fouled, hit a free throw, but then Ryan Holbrook shot his only three pointer of the night, to give DP the lead at 50-40. Kapena O'Neal then scored and was fouled on the way up.

As the Santa Barbara Press-Telegram termed it "It turned out to be a painful score for both teams." This is when the theatrics took over, when smart kids turn stupid and things got ugly for a moment.

Billings, all senior 6-foot-5 of him, reacted to O'Neal's score by throwing an uppercut to the body, which connected forcing O'Neal to leave the game. Of course, Billings was called for a technical and ejected, a crucial loss for San Marcos at a time when they were already down 12 points 52-40.

Billings finished early, with 16 points and 10 rebounds. And according to the Santa Barbara News-Press, "It was the first technical foul of the season for Billings, who had some well-chronicled bouts of ill temper last season.

While O'Neal finished with only the two points he shot before getting decked by Billings, Dan Hoefer shot and missed his free throw for him. But by that point in the game, it was way too late for San Marcos to make any kind of comeback, and Dos Pueblos just continued to cruise.

San Marcos also didn't help itself any by missing 14 of 28 free throws. Sonny Oden and Matt James each had 10 points for San Marcos while Legans had 13 points and Sears 11 for Dos Pueblos.

Here's the scoring:

San Marcos: Moharram 5, Gutierrez 4, Robertson 5, Arndt 3, Billings 16, Oden 10, McOwen 4, James 10.

Dos Pueblos: Legans 13, Sears 11, Archuleta 0, Yamada 0, Holbrook 7, Jenkins 23, Hickman 0, Bruce 5, Hoefer 7, O'Neal 2.

3-point goals-SM 3 (Robertson, Oden, James), DP 5 (Legans 2, Sears, Holbrook, Bruce). Fouled out-Jenkins, Hoefer. Technical fouls-Billings (ejected), O'Neal.