san fernando v. Chatsworth

SoCal High School & Prep Report

Daily News On: San Fernando 83, Chatsworth 74--(January 23, 1998)

Vincent Bonsignore of the Daily News attended this game and wrote an interesting story about it, and more importantly about the No. 2 or No. 1 team in the SFV region (depending upon which poll you believe), and how the team just lacks focus. Again, because the Daily News does not have a website, unless you bought a copy of Thursday's paper, you missed the report. Oh, and by the way, San Fernando won, 83-74. Here is the excepted article from Wednesday's paper. And we don't necessarily agree with everything Bonsignore says, but we think it's an important piece. So here it is:

No. 2 San Fernando Could Be Much Better
Tigers Sometimes Lose Focus, Lack Killer Instinct

By Vincent Bonsignore
Daily News Staff Writer

At first glance, the San Fernando High boys' basketball team is enjoying quite a year.

The No. 2 Tigers, strong favorites to win the City Section 3-A championship have lost only twice in 16 outings and are unbeaten in three Northwest Valley Conference games after Wednesday's 83-74 win over Chatsworth.

But a closer look reveals some disturbing facts.

San Fernando (16-2, 3-0) has played in spurts in all three conference wins, building big leads but then surrendering them with lackluster play, silly fouls and poor rebounding. The tigers have not played a strong game from start to finish in quite a while, needing overtime to avoid an upset against Cleveland last Wednesday (January 14) after leading by 15 points and escaping against Taft on Friday (January 16) with a 73-61 win thanks to a late run.

Maybe it's a lack of focus. Or maybe the Tigers haven't made the transition yet from a team that doesn't historically win much to won that's considered the class of the conference.

Perhaps San Fernando is just suffering though a difficulet stretch in a long season.

Whatever the case, Tiger's coach Mick Cady wants things to change. Fast.

"You'd hate for it to come to (a loss)," Cady said. "But we need to wake up."

The problems aren't limited to games. Cady has noticed a lack of concentration in practice lately. Even guard Devin Montgomery, who scored 25 points to lead the way against Chatsworth (10-7, 1-2), concedes the Tigers have had one good practice all year.

"We definitely need to focus better," Montgomery said. "Right now, we just don't have that killer instinct you need. We need to bury people when we get the chance."

Montgomery came to the rescue against the Chancellors, picking up for an ineffective Mike Page [Jerry's note: Conincidentally Page was the LA Times' "Athlete of the Week" this week. Go figure] (five points, none in the first half) with a strong effort on both ends of the floor. He led a fourth-quarter surge in which San Fernando put the game away by outscoring Chatsworth 13-7 down the stretch.

Bryson Atkins added 19 points for the Tigers and Luis DeLaRosa scored 16 points. Chatsworth got 24 points from Donnie McNeal.

Prior to the game-ending run, the Tigers led 68-67 with just over two minutes to play.

Cady is running out of answers for the Tigers' struggles. Yet it's difficult to complaint-- or make demands-- when his team has the record it does.

"Usually after a loss you can come into practice fired up looking to get back on track. A loss gets your attention." Cady said. "But even though we haven't played very good, we haven't lost. Sometimes that makes (players) think things come easy."