Last spring, the Christopher High boys basketball team—despite returning most of its key players from the 2019-2020 team that advanced to the program’s first-ever Central Coast Section playoff championship game—couldn’t come up with the answers as it made a somewhat shocking early exit from the playoffs to Leigh High, 66-62 in the Division II quarterfinals.
This year’s Christopher team—despite undergoing some rough patches through the first half of the season—has found its chemistry and is seemingly getting better each time it steps on the court. The results are showing and could be a harbinger for a deep playoff run.
The Cougars were 12-6 overall and 6-1 in Pacific Coast League Gabilan Division play entering a Feb. 2 contest against Pacific Grove. Their only loss in league came to Palma 49-46 on Jan. 21, but they get a chance to exact some payback as they host the Chieftains on Feb. 10.
In the Palma game, CHS trailed by 14 points early in the third quarter before unleashing a furious 13-0 run that senior wing Tobenna Ezeokeke said was the tipping point of the team’s season.
“After we were down by 14, there was a six-minute stretch we played that was probably our best span of the season,” he said. “I said after the game that’s who we are as a team because we were playing aggressive, smart on offense and playing exactly how we know how to play. I told everybody to look at the film because that is who we are as a team. If we can play like that, we’ll be pretty hard to beat in CCS.”
Ezeokeke and fellow seniors Rickey Becker and E.J. Yufenyuy are returning starters and as expected the trio have been pretty solid all season long. The additions of Oakwood-transfer Bricen Buciak and newcomer Braddock Kjellesvig—a 6-foot-5 freshman center—makes the team a pretty formidable group.
However, when you include senior Jeremy Jacinto and juniors Chris Naulls, Tim McClain and Christian Kjellesvig, the Cougars are balanced, deep and able to wear teams down with their pressure defense.
“Our man defense is getting better, we’re rotating much better than earlier in the year on defense and our communication has improved,” coach Adam Sax said. “We’re also getting out in transition and pushing the ball into our running lanes.”
Ezeokeke and Becker have been integral in the greatest four-year stretch in program history. Both play physical and tough, with Becker taking a greater role in facilitating this season after being the first or second scoring option on the team the last couple of years.
Of course, come playoff time, Becker can be counted upon to make shots in the final minutes of a game. So can Ezeokeke, who has matured both physically and mentally and has become a force on the offensive and defensive end. Ezeokeke likes the way the team is coming together after a tough start in which they got doubled up in losses to Clovis West (82-40) and Monte Vista (70-35) and nearly doubled up in a 63-35 loss to Dougherty Valley.
“We’ve come far and I like where we are,” Ezeokeke said. “Those preseason (non-league) games are what brought us here because playing those teams made us better. When you’re playing a Clovis North or a Dougherty Valley, it’s like,’OK, these teams we’re playing now aren’t those teams so we know how to beat them.’”
With the graduation of Duncan Ellis and Owen McCarry off last year’s team, Ezeokeke knew he would have to help fill the leadership role they had previously held.
“With Duncan and Owen gone I knew this is the year where I really needed to step it up and take it to another level from a leadership standpoint,” Ezeokeke said. “In the same way I looked up to Duncan, now some of the guys are looking up to me so I can’t be doing the things I was always doing. Duncan was an amazing leader and he’s not here anymore so someone had to be that for our team this year.”
Throughout the season but particularly of late, Sax has been emphasizing offensive rebounding, making the extra pass, sharing the basketball and tightening things up on defense.
“We’ve had some lapses here and there and we watch that on film,” he said. “We review that in practice and go over it, and it’s a matter of repetition to master it and hopefully by the end of league, we’re all working together and have this synergy to be more successful. We like to shoot 3s and I think that aspect of our game has improved a lot since the start of the season. The more reps we get, the better these guys get.”
down shots from the elbow area in. File photo.
Sports editor Emanuel Lee can be reached at [email protected] and (831) 886-0471, ext. 3958.
