SHP can’t keep up with Valley Christian

SHP hung with the Warriors for about three quarters. But Valley Christian, which qualified for the CCS Open Division bracket last year after winning the Division II championship two years ago, pulled away in the fourth quarter to post a 66-50 win Thursday night in Burlingame.

“I know what a good team looks like,” Wulbrun said. “That will be one of the best teams we’ll play this season.”

With the win, Valley (4-0) advances to Friday night’s championship game. The Warriors will face host Burlingame at 8 p.m. The Panthers beat Palo Alto, 56-38, in the other semifinal.

Despite the 15-point loss, the Gators were never really out of the game against Valley, which, despite holding a double-digit lead for most of the game, never quite managed to put SHP away.

Twice SHP (3-1) cut its deficit to single digits — the Gators trailed by six, 24-18, midway through the first half and the were down by nine, 34-25, early in the third quarter — but SHP could not get the stop on one end and score on the other to really put the pressure on Valley.

“We showed some resilience,” Wulbrun said.

If the Gators shot the ball better in the first half, the outcome could have been different. SHP was just 5 for 17 from the field in opening half, a 29% clip. It got better in the second half, as the Gators hit on 50% of their shots, on 11 for 22 shooting.

They got off to a decent start. Alex Osterloh, who tied for team-high scoring honor with 16 points, drained a 3-pointer to open the game. When Pat Bala, who also had 16, knocked down a 3 midway through the opening period, the Gators had an 8-3 lead.

But the offense dried up the rest of quarter for SHP, as the Gators managed just one more point over the final 4:31. Valley, meanwhile, embarked on a 10-0, with Evan Lee getting it started with a three-point play, followed by a steal and dunk from Jadon Shabaglian, a corner 3 from Lee and slashing layup from Shabgalian. Hudson Dennison capped the quarter with a putback bucket and the Warriors led 15-9 after the first quarter.

Lee finished with a game-high 20 points for the Warriors.

Zack Beals made an acrobatic flip shot to open the scoring in the second period for SHP, but the Warriors responded with a 9-0 run, punctuated by a Teniola Bamisebi dunk to put Valley up 24-11 with 4:36 left in the first half.

SHP, meanwhile, was struggling to find any kind of offense, so the Gators started to attack the basket and get to the free throw line. Osterloh converted a three-point play and followed that with four straight free throws converted to close to 24-18 with 3:32 left in the half, but the Warriors kept SHP at arms’ length and led 30-21 at the break.

The third quarter was much like the first two as the Gators battled to stay within shouting distance of the Warriors. Each time it looked like Valley was ready to put SHP away, the Gators would stay alive. Down 43-28, Bala hit a layup and then knocked down a 3-pointer and SHP was down on 10, 43-33.

They would get no closer the rest of the way. When Valley hit a 3 early in the fourth, the Warriors were up 17, 52-35, and if there were any thoughts of a Gators’ rally, they were dashed by the Warriors rebounding work. While Valley only out-rebounded SHP 32-28 for the game, the Warriors dominated the boards in the fourth, pulling down 11 rebounds, seven of which were on the offensive end.

“They were a terror on the offensive glass,” Wulbrun said.

Valley would go on to outscore SHP 18-15 in the fourth to close out the win. Despite the loss, Wulbrun is pretty confident his team learned a lot in a loss.

“Valley Christian is a very good basketball team,” Wulbrun said. “I’m not discouraged. … I hope we can look back later in the season and say we learned a lot (from this game).”

Burlingame 56, Palo Alto 38

The Panthers punched their ticket to the Burlingame Lions Club Invitational final with the win over the Vikings.

While Burlingame (5-1) put up nearly 60 points, it was the Panthers’ defense that did the bulk of the damage, holding Palo Alto (4-1) to just 14 points in the first half — nine in the first and five in the second quarter.

Palo Alto had one run late in the third quarter, outscoring the Panthers 8-2 to close 35-24 with 1:18 left in the third, but Burlingame would bridge the third and fourth quarters with a 9-0 run to build a 20-point lead, 44-24, with 6:55 left.

Burlingame sophomore Lucca Maher had a strong, all-around game, finishing with a team-high 14 points. David Parrot and Payton Fong-Heady each added 10, but it was senior Rowan Maher who had the highlight plays of the game. A little more than a minute into the game, he came flying down the lane for a putback dunk, swinging around on the rim to avoid getting hurt.

With under a minute left in the third quarter, Rowan Maher had his second big dunk of the night, this time driving the lane and throwing down a tomahawk jam to put the Panthers up 37-24.