Prep Basketball Notebook: Central Catholic uses big second half to beat Stagg

Central Catholic boys basketball coach Mike Wilson is still looking for consistency from his team.

The Raiders, the defending CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Div. III champions, have struggled to put four complete quarters together in the early part of the 2018-19 season.

That trend continued on Wednesday in their first round game of the 2018 Mark Gallo Invitational as the Raiders (3-2) held a narrow two-point lead at halftime against Stagg (3-5) before a strong second-half led to a 53-39 victory.

“In every game, it’s been a tale of two halves,” Wilson said. “It’s getting tiresome.”

Part of the reason for the struggles for Central Catholic is they have had only five full practices as a team with a couple of members (seniors D’Angelo Bellamy and Justin Traina) being on the football team that played in the section title game on Dec. 1. Also, last year’s second leading scorer Nic Sani (10.7 points per game) is out for the entire season after suffering a shoulder injury during the football season.

“I am trying to create cohesiveness with this team,” Wilson said. “I want the team to give extra effort.”

Junior guard Dayton Magana provided the spark the Raiders needed on Wednesday with 22 points.

“He (Magana) has been our most consistent player,” Wilson said. “I know that I always get 100% out of him.”

Senior forward Charles Hallman had 13 points while sophomore Myles Clayton added nine. The Raiders will face the winner of Immanuel/Santa Cruz at 8 p.m. on Thursday.

Bear Creek 73, Beyer 66 : The Patriots (5-1) trailed by 15 midway through the third and were never able to recover. Senior guard McKay Bundy had 15 points. Junior guard Connor Lanz had 36 points for Bear Creek.

Grant 76, Ripon 37 : The Pacers (3-2 )half-court trap defense caused problems for the Indians (3-4) all night. Senior center Vincent Olmo had 15 points for Ripon.

This story was originally published December 12, 2018 at 8:48 PM.