LOS GATOS — Los Gatos boys basketball is back in the CCS Division I championship.
The Wildcats punched their ticket to the title game with a 59-43 win over Carlmont on Thursday night, returning to the championship match after a one-year hiatus by knocking off the defending champions at home.
The win was refreshing vindication for a Los Gatos team that was upset in overtime by Homestead to end its season prematurely in the D-I quarterfinals last season.
This time around, the Wildcats (21-5), who pulled down the No. 2 seed for the fourth straight season, took care of business with a 57-52 win over Mountain View in the quarterfinals.
And as the Cats pulled away from Carlmont midway through the fourth quarter, coach Nick Ward could finally exhale. In front of a full student section and near-capacity crowd, Los Gatos was back.
“You start feeling, you start believing, ‘Hey, we can do this,’” Ward said. “Just incredible. We were half-joking with the guys throughout the season. We get to 10 league wins, and we’re joking, going, ‘Yeah, who would have thought this group’s got 10 league wins? Wow, in this league, no way.’
“And then we won on Tuesday, ‘Hey, we’re in the semis, guys. Like gosh, with this group?’ And then tonight, it’s just like, ‘We’re playing on Saturday. Holy heck, that’s incredible.’”
Ward said Los Gatos, which started two freshmen and three seniors, was playing with house money by reaching this point.
Thanks to the youngsters and a blend of seniors who waited their turn behind a strong team last year, a team with one returning starter gets a chance to cash in all of its chips on Saturday in Santa Clara.
“We had some young kids step up in a big way tonight,” Ward said. “Ryan Jamieson, best night of the year. Ollie Evans hit a couple. Milos (Grabovac) just started to hit some tough, tough shots. And that’s such a demoralizing feeling when you’re on the other end of that, because they are good defensively, and to be able to see that ball go through at the end of possessions like that is hard. So kudos to our young guys stepping up.”
Los Gatos’ crowd pulled the Cats across the finish line, and Ward had high praise for the atmosphere that steadily built during the girls game that preceded the boys.
It peaked when Los Gatos’ lead passed 10 midway through the fourth, then stretched out near 20 at the end of the game, convincing Carlmont coach Suhail Mohammadi to wave the white flag and sub in his bench.
“Closing teams out, that was the hard thing for us to do against better opponents, and we were able to close it out tonight,” Ward said. “So midway through the fourth, I felt like the crowd was still into it, and that’s a big thing, because that means things are still going in our direction. So I’d say probably like that four-minute mark, yeah, the crowd was incredible.”
For Carlmont, the coda to its run in the D-I tournament was one of pride and disappointment. The Scots (15-11) lost several key players from their title team as well as coach John Schrup, who resigned to spend more time with his young family.
Nevertheless, they carved out their own identity this year and now await a potential CIF NorCal at-large berth on Sunday.
“It’s a good learning experience for our boys to be in this atmosphere, to feel this type of intensity,” Mohammadi said. “It is pressure, and that’s what builds good basketball players at the end of the day, these environments with crazy fans that are fun for the players.
“But it definitely affects them. So they got to experience it, and I hope they learned from it. And if they’re ever in this situation moving forward, they’ll learn how to adapt in the environment that they were playing in tonight. Because this was an awesome environment overall.”
Freshman Grabovac led Los Gatos with 14 points, while sophomore Jamieson and senior Dionysis Maroudas each had 11. Senior Will Campbell added 10.
Jordan Rice led Carlmont with 22 points.
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