SAN FRANCISCO - Too tall. Too talented. Too cohesive. Just too much.
That's what Sacred Heart Cathedral coach Darrell Barbour had to be thinking after his team fell to first-place St. Francis 80-65 on Saturday night.
The victory was important for St. Francis. It keeps the Lancers (19-3, 10-2) one game ahead of Serra (17-5, 8-3) with two games left to play for each team in the WCAL season -- against visiting Mitty on Wednesday night and at Riordan on Saturday night. Serra finishes at St. Ignatius on Wednesday and at home against Valley Christian on Saturday.
St. Francis defeated Sacred Heart Cathedral 45-42 Jan. 24 in Mountain View, but this game was a different animal.
"It was a total contrast to the game we had with them down there," Barbour said. "We gave up 43 points that night and we had a chance to win. Tonight they shot the ball well early and they got to the loose balls and I thought they controlled the physical part also. I thought our energy was a little off. We had won three games in a row and one of the reasons was our energy level. We played in spurts with our energy level and when you play a good team like this, you can't have that."
The Fightin' Irish (12-10, 6-6) led St. Francis 16-9 in the first quarter but SF finished the period with a flourish and led 22-19 after one quarter. Noah Stapes made three 3-pointers in the first quarter.
St. Francis never trailed after Joseph Mihanovic's field goal in the final minute of the first quarter.
"Noah got us going there a little in the first quarter," SF coach Mike Motil said. "And we started to switch up our defenses a little and started getting some stops and got to play in transition a little bit. It was a nice ball game. We have a couple of kids who can score the basketball every now and then."
Said Stapes: "Hitting those threes was key in bringing us back and keeping our heads up. We knew this team would come out running and gunning and we came back at them and kept on going and came out with a W."
St. Francis worked the ball well on offense and found the open man for high-percentage shots. David Parsons had success for SHC in both driving to the basket and shooting from outside and scored 24 points. But he didn't have much help as only Alfred Hollins (14 points) joined him in double figures.
The Lancers put four players in double figures -- Giuseppe Benedetti (21 points), Mihanovic (16 points), Stapes (13) and Darius Thomas (10).
"We have tons of guys who can score," Stapes said. "I don't know what the other guys' game plan is for us because we have different high scorers every game. We're all playing for each other and have the same cause and we just come together for each other as a family."
A 43-37 halftime deficit turned into 63-52 after three quarters as Benedetti poured in six third-quarter points for SF. The Irish had little going offensively outside of Parsons and got almost no second-chance shots.
