A high school varsity basketball showdown at Santa Clara High school Saturday ended in a Palo Alto Viking (25-1) crush of the (18-7) Evergreen Valley Cougars in the quarterfinals of the Central Coast Section (CCS) Division II playoffs, 64-44.
With 10 points and 13 assists, numerous blocks, steals and rebounds, junior Guard Jeremy Lin had a brilliant game. “I was pumped up, and so was out whole team.”
Lin went on to say, “We didn’t want what happened last year to happen to us again. That has been in the back of out heads this whole year.”
In their 2003-2004 season, the Vikings lost in the quarterfinals at the buzzer in overtime to a very physical North Salinas Team. “[North Salinas] out-rebounded us, and was more aggressive,” Lin said. It was important for the Vikings to get through this round of CCS, and move on to the semifinals according to Lin
To kick off the game, the Cougars’ senior Guard Edward Lapitan hit fellow senior Forward Jeff Brass, who scored the first two points of the game. Lapitan, who had been on Viking Coach Peter Diepenbrock’s mind would be guarded by junior forward Steven Brown. “He has a very good outside shot,” Diepenbrock said. Lapitan, who scored 11 points to lead his team in scoring, hit three three-pointers in the losing effort.
After being down 2-0 in the first minute of the game, the Vikings went on a 20-7 run, including a heads-up pass from Lin to senior forward Brian Baskauskas, who ended the first quarter with an easy lay up off of the pass, and added two points to his 18-point total for the game.
As the second quarter began, Lin came out of the game. In his place was junior guard Brad Lehman, who scored two points in the game but brought his stellar defense and contributed to many of the teams’ steals and caused turnovers.
When Lin came back into the game only moments later, he immediately drove to the hoop, and tossed in a two-point lay up. Throughout the quarter Lin would impress the crowd numerous times with skill-full passes, an acrobatic pul-up three-point jump shot, and a blocked shot, attempted by the Cougars’ center senior Jeff Brass, who stands at 6’6” tall.
The Vikings dominated for the rest of the game both offensively and defensively. “[Paly] made the game hard and fast-paced,” Lapitan said when the game was over, and his Cougars had lost the game by 20 points.
Paly had a dominating performance against Sequoia last Tuesday, Winning the game 74-44, to advance to the finals.