Boys basketball beat Santa Clara High School 55-50 today, January 11. Santa Clara proved to be a difficult opponent as the score became close in the middle of the game, but the Eagles were able to secure the lead in the final quarter.

Junior Joey Malgesini scored the most points for his team, bringing in 14 of the 55 points. Senior Nate Vieira came in with 11 points and junior Steven Garverick scored 9 points.

“It was a close game,” Steven said. “We played good defense against [Santa Clara’s] star, [Cole] Lockwood.”

The team started the game strong with a 12-0 run, but as the game progressed, its lead started to diminish.

“We had a good start with great effort and ball movement,” senior Conrad Rogers said. “But then our defense became shaky, so the game became close.”

Though their opponent was catching up, the team members did not let this deter them. The team was able to regain its lead by ramping up in both defense and offense. The last twenty seconds were action packed with two free throws made by Joey and a last second layup by Steven.

“Eventually we got back to playing good defense and hit some clutch free throws to win the close game,” Conrad said. “Overall, it was a great team effort, and we balled.”

This game brings the team’s league record to 3-0 so far. The team exhibited a strong offensive push and recognized many areas to work on in terms of defense.

“Though this was a great win for us, and we’re excited about the 3-0 start to league, we can’t let wins cover up all the mistakes we made,” Co-captain senior Kieran Stolorz said. “There were still a ton of missed defensive assignments and rotations, and we definitely need to rebound better. Forgetting these ‘little things’ will come back to bite us in any league game.”

Using this game as a lesson and learning from mistakes will help the team work on defense for future league games.

“As a senior and a captain I need to do a better job of holding guys accountable, and having them pay attention to the fundamentals,” Kieran said. “If we can fix these basic things, our future is bright.”