Down to just five players, Pitman boys basketball wins big over Modesto in CCAL matchup
More than halfway through its season, the Pitman boys basketball team has seen it all.
The Pride have won nail-biters and blowouts, but have lost a few as well.
They’ve also recently had players hampered with injuries and sidelined due to COVID-19 protocols — both at the same time.
According to head coach Harvey Marable, two players are out due to COVID protocols, one sat due to a non-COVID related illness and three were injured.
Pitman has played with five players its first two Central California Athletic League games and won both. They beat Gregori 62-58 on Wednesday and ended the week securing a 69-42, wire-to-wire win over Modesto Friday night.
“We have themes for every day of the week and on Thursday, our theme was thankful,” said Marable. “I’m just thankful to have players like I have that are willing to put in the time and work.”
The Pride (10-7, 2-0) flowed seamlessly through their sets on offense, setting flare screens and executing backdoor cuts for layups, and forced the Panthers (5-6, 0-2) into contested shots on defense.
They jumped out to a 17-6 first quarter lead that ballooned to 36-18 by halftime.
Modesto, which has had to deal with COVID protocols as well, played just its second game in nearly a month. Before this week, its last game action was a 59-27 win over Davis on Dec. 17.
The Panthers played their best in the third quarter. They scored 13 points, but were unable to gain any ground on the depleted, yet tough Pride team.
Pitman scored 15 points in the quarter and ended the period on a 40-foot buzzer-beater from Robert Salmon.
The 6-foot-7 forward followed up Wednesday’s 35 point performance with 31 points Friday night.
“Anyone would like to have that combination rebounder, scorer and defender and he gives us all three of those,” Marable said. “Every night we know that we’re gonna get some points inside because of him.”
Freshman Avery Sanchez and sophomore Justin Anderson each added 13 points.
The Pride scored 18 fourth-quarter points to finish off an all-around impressive victory.
Taking it one week at a time
Pitman will play its next three CCAL games on the road, starting on Wednesday against Enochs.
Marable expects players to start returning throughout next week and says at least four will be ready for Friday’s rematch with Downey – the Pride won 63-51 earlier this season in the Modesto City Classic.
He is anxiously awaiting the return of his players who will add depth and experience to the assist the five who have played every minute of Pitman’s last two games.
“We’ll be able to sub,” said Marable on what he’s looking forward to most when his full team returns. “We’re inexperienced in three and a half spots.”
For now, he’s not too worried about what his team will be by season’s end, he’s taking things one week at a time.
“I know next week, we have two tough games,” he said. “We talked about just increasing our execution because there’s some things that we’re messing up on and I want to decrease those occurrences.”
