San Mateo advances

The last time a Bearcats team picked up a win in the Central Coast Section basketball playoffs, the year was 2009. Fast forward three years and San Mateo is back in the win column. Representing the Peninsula Athletic League as the Lake Division champions, the Bearcats defeated Live Oak 51-43 Tuesday night in CCS Division III action.

"We’re excited because our school hasn’t felt this for a while,” said San Mateo forward and Lake Division Most Valuable Player Ben Skelton, who scored 13 points in the win. "We just had to play defense, and shut them down.”

The Bearcats set the tone defensively from the onset, allowing just 17 points in the first half. And while they struggled from the floor and from the foul line in the second half, their commitment to that defense early on was the key to the victory.

"We just had to quit rushing,” said San Mateo coach Julian Hudson. "We were trying to rush. (Live Oak) tried to put a little pressure on us and we were just rushing trying to beat it right away rather than taking our time and running our stuff.”

Tuesday’s win was a game the Bearcats led from the six-minute mark of the first quarter; but it wasn’t always the most comfortable of things.

San Mateo led 13-9 after one quarter of play, with Skelton and John Schrup carrying the load offensively.

The Bearcats then built their biggest lead of the half behind some aggressive defense. Andrew Ho was huge off the bench for San Mateo in the second quarter. In that period alone, he accounted for five steals. The Bearcats led by 10 twice.

"His energy, it really settled up down,” Hudson said of Ho. "He’s really the calming influence on the team even though you see him running around and hustling.”

Live Oak was 6 of 19 from the floor in the first half, while Skelton and Schrup paced the Bearcats with eight and seven points respectively. They led 27-17 at halftime.

But the Acorns made their run in the third quarter behind a little defense of their own. Schrup came out and knocked down a 3-pointer out of the gate, but before it was all said and done in the third, Live Oak had trimmed the lead to four — taking advantage of some foul trouble by San Mateo that had the Acorns in the bonus by the 2:31 mark of the third period.

"I think (the key) was just sticking together,” Schrup said of the third quarter. "And slowing down the offense and just being able to run everything together. We’ve been in this position before. So, we just stayed under control. We were able to come together and just execute.”

San Mateo put together a 7-2 run to start the fourth quarter and rebuilt that half-time lead. They found themselves up 10 following a sweet reverse layup courtesy of Robert Murphy with 3:02 left in the game.

From there, it was a matter of protecting their first CCS win in three years. Live Oak got to within six, but that was it.

Skelton finished with 13 points, six rebounds and three blocked shots. Schrup led San Mateo with 14 points and seven boards.

Live Oak was led by Austin Carvalho and his 20 points.

With the win, San Mateo advances to play the No. 3 seed Aptos on Thursday night.