The PAL North schedule is more than halfway complete, and it’s still all but impossible to tell who’s going to win the league, as well as which teams claim the top two spots to advance to the league’s tournament on February 11 and 12.
The first half of the double-round robin wrapped up on Tuesday with Jefferson beating Half Moon Bay 46-42. J.J. Cruz’s and-1 midway through the third quarter gave the Grizzlies the lead for good, and they’d go up by as much as 10 in the fourth quarter before one last HMB push cut it to 40-37 on back-to-back baskets by Ben McKnight, who scored a game-high 16 off the bench. Luis Villareal restored momentum for Jefferson (11-7, 5-1) with the biggest play of the night, ripping a rebound out of a defender’s hands and laying it in to put his team up by five. Cruz and Marquez Costiniano each scored 11 for the hosts, while Brooks Daniels scored six of his nine in the second quarter. Mykola Ediger finished with 14 points and five assists for the Cougars in the defeat.
Costiniano would have to hold the slight edge for North Division MVP right now, as Jefferson’s lone league loss came without him, 59-54 to Terra Nova on the 15th. The teams will meet again next Wednesday in Daly City.
As for those Tigers, they kept pace on Wednesday night by avenging an earlier loss to El Camino, 52-34. Terra Nova (13-6, 5-2) rattled off a 13-2 run in the third quarter to take control of the game, using two Justin Milch 3-pointers after the Colts had cut the deficit to seven. Jordan Salgado scored 15 for TN while Milch added 10. El Camino (3-16, 2-5) got 11 points from Thomas Haysbert, but played without Antonio Roussanov (illness), who scored 28 in a 55-54 win over the Tigers on January 8.
Further down the coast, Half Moon Bay (12-7, 5-2) got back to business with a 71-40 win over Oceana (2-15, 1-6). The Cougars got 10 early points from McKnight and a game-high 14 from Mario Campbell.
Until Tuesday’s trip to Jefferson, HMB’s lone league loss had been to Westmoor (10-9, 5-2). The Rams might have the most balanced team out of the entire league, and while much of the division relies on outside shooting, they crash the boards and relentlessly attack the hoop. In Wednesday’s 51-35 win over South San Francisco (6-12, 1-6), the Rams got 15 points from John Aguas and 13 from Jasaiah Cox.
Of the four teams in the title hunt, two will meet Friday as Terra Nova makes the trip to Westmoor. The Tigers won the first meeting, 66-55 on January 11.
