Modesto Christian boys hold off Beyer 61-54

Beyer High did not become the first Modesto Metro Conference boys basketball team to beat Modesto Christian in league play. That accomplishment will have to wait.

But what the Patriots did on their home court before falling 61-54 to the Crusaders on Wednesday night was nearly as important as walking out with a win.

Beyer became the first MMC team to battle Modesto Christian fearlessly for 32 minutes.

“We had nothing to lose, so we just came out to face the monster and punch him in the mouth early,” said Beyer guard Jake Polack, who hit 8 of 9 shots and finished with 19 points and five assists. “We just tried to make it a game.”

The Patriots (15-3, 4-2 MMC) certainly did that, using a defensive tactic the Crusaders (14-3, 6-0) are likely to see often as the season wears on.

Beyer coach Kyle McKim installed a sagging 1-3-1 zone that he hoped would accomplish two things. First, the plan was to make Modesto Christian shoot from the outside, and when that happened, the Patriots would have enough players inside to grab rebounds.

The first part worked as the Crusaders connected on only 3 of 17 shots from three-point range. But the second tier of the plan? Well, there’s only so much you can do with a vertically challenged roster against a team as tall as Modesto Christian.

The Crusaders grabbed 19 offensive rebounds, and power forward Anthony Townes had a hard-earned 21 points and 11 rebounds to account for the bulk of Modesto Christian’s inside game.

“We’re kind of struggling offensively right now and we know the game plan for other teams will be to crowd the paint and have us have to make shots,” said Modesto Christian coach Richard Midgley. “We’re still trying to force it inside, and when we do get it in there, we need to do a better job of finishing.”

How did Beyer know so much about how to play Modesto Christian? Call it bulk scouting. Whenever the Crusaders are playing locally on a night the Patriots are off, McKim and several players are in the stands.

“I’ve seen them five or six times,” Polack said. “We knew what they were going to do and we tried to prepare the best we could. But that’s some serious size they have.”

And some serious spunk on Beyer’s side.

The Patriots announced their intent to make it a game as George Dancer scored the last eight points in a 10-0 Beyer run to give it a 15-14 lead early in the second quarter.

Modesto Christian again pulled away to an eight-point advantage three minutes into the second half, but three different Beyer players hit three-pointers during a 13-5 spurt that pulled the teams even at 43-43 with 41 seconds left in the third quarter.

“Beyer does a great job with their four-out dribble drive and had a lot of guys hitting shots,” Midgley said. “They did a great job and we needed to defend them better.”

Modesto Christian scored twice in the final 14 seconds of the quarter to take a 47-43 lead into the last eight minutes, and the margin was still four, 56-52, when Dancer hit a free throw with 3:20 left.

That’s when the Crusaders finally took advantage of the zone defense to put away the win, as Jeff Wu’s second three-pointer of the quarter with 2:15 left pushed the margin back to seven points, and the Patriots finally were out of heroics.

Wu finished with 14 points, and Christian Ellis had 10 points, seven assists and five steals.

Tanner Gentry contributed nine points for Beyer, all on three-pointers, to supply more fearless play off the Patriots’ bench.

“Playing without fear is big for us,” McKim said. “They’ve looked forward to this game and talked about it for a year. They weren’t running from it and they weren’t afraid of it.

“They played like they wanted it and I couldn’t be more proud of their effort and the way they represented themselves.”

This story was originally published January 21, 2015 at 10:18 PM with the headline "Modesto Christian boys hold off Beyer 61-54."