By Ed Piper, Jr.
Andrei Soriano did a good job covering La Jolla's Charlie Gal initially. But then the 6'3" post for Madison made a few mistakes and visibly lost concentration, and Gal began to operate under the basket without much resistance on Soriano's part in the two teams' matchup Jan. 12.
The Madison forward, built big, wearing glasses and a man pigtail, scored one basket, then followed that with a right-handed jump hook over Gal in the lane to bring the Warhawks back to 15-8 after they trailed by as many as 10 in the first quarter Thursday night. The final went to La Jolla, 60-38.
Also providing opposition underneath for Coach Mike Stutz's squad were Derek Slider, a 6'2" senior, and Dontae Grady, coming in at about the same height. They alternated on the 6'5" Gal, meaning about 600 pounds were being used to try to wear down and fluster the solid La Jolla junior, who's got to weigh in at at least 200 pounds himself, though it's not listed on the team's MaxPreps roster.
Gal was fouled on an early attempt, and made two free throws. He was called for traveling midway through the opening period, a nasty habit he has to overcome. He, a short time later, drew another foul and made one of two charity tosses.
Late in the period, as if to answer Soriano's jump hook, Charlie scored on his patented back-in-then-swing-back-and-forth move from the right block below the basket. You can bet he practiced that a lot with his club team, and with Coach Paul Baranowski, over the past year. It's his bread and butter.
Soriano was basically done for the night, hardly being heard from again. The young man has athletic talent, but I think he just got frustrated in trying to cover his active counterpart. He shouldn't give up so easily.
Gal has a way of wearing on you, though, if you have to cover him. If he is on the left baseline, you know that he is going to fake toward the end line--or go ahead, if you give it to him--and swing into the lane for a shot. From the box on the opposite side of the lane, he is going to favor his right hand by going toward his left and banking the ball off the backboard.
Grady was the one who lost his temper in the third quarter after the Vikes' Nick Hammel accidentally slammed into him backwards, hitting him in the forehead and knocking him to the floor. Though it wasn't intended, the young man, understandably upset, let his mouth get the better of him and the referees ejected him when he cursed angrily and loudly at them twice within the span of a handful of seconds. That was too bad.
Stutz, though under control, came out onto the floor partway to discuss the play with the officials. But the incident served to rile up the Madison players a little, leading to the same referee who called the two technicals to talk to both teams about settling down. Baranowski said he felt the referees did a good job of managing the game.
The student athletes representing Clairemont hadn't been taking things lying down before that. Back in the first quarter, to set a tone, they had committed clean but physical fouls, first, on Gal, then on Reed Farley. The latter was by Slider.
These are good athletes, while maybe not being polished basketball players. Who is at age 16 or 17?
To the credit of the referees and Stutz, the Warhawk players didn't get out of control. They weren't mouthy. Daniel McColl of the Vikings afterward said that the Madison players were "handsy", by which he meant they made a lot of contact with their hands. But that isn't dirty basketball. But they weren't talking trash, despite the 22-point thrashing they suffered. It was more pure frustration.
Meanwhile, Gal headed for Matt Bridges' trainer's table at the far corner of the Big Gym in the third quarter. He went down with a painful left shin, lying on the playing surface with a grimace on his face, which is something you don't see Charlie do. The trainer taped a big bag of ice to his ankle as he lay on the table alongside the court throughout the fourth quarter. He looked pretty worn out, appropriate after the wear-and-tear he took from Soriano, Grady, and Slider.
The Vikings achieved a level of respect in the eyes of their opponents, winning decisively and clearly being the superior team on this night. Even the La Jolla reserves maintained the lead: Jacob Ohara, who's actually in the rotation, and Behzad Hashemi, who scored some points in closing minutes for the second straight game, as well as McClain Thiel and Garrett Brown. Madison couldn't make any headway against them, which has got to please Baranowski, attending a family wedding over the Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend in Tucson.
Hashemi was rewarded for his productive pair of games in a cameo role by being added to the varsity the head coach maintains on maxpreps.com.
Farley's main assignment over the three-day break, given to him by Baranowski as the two began moving toward the exits Thursday night, was to limit his basketball activity to shooting. He's got to give his left arm, which he dislocated for the first time two nights earlier and banged again Thursday night, time for some healing.
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