The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Struggle with league opponents
The holiday break always poses a challenge for high school athletic programs but this past one was fairly successful for the Crested Butte Titans boy’s basketball team.
With nearly the entire varsity squad in town to practice, coach Brandin Hamilton made the most of the workouts and the players responded.
“We maintained our fitness and worked a lot on our transition offense and transition defense,” says Hamilton. “The kids went at it pretty hard.”
The effort paid off in their first game following the break as they headed to Creede on Thursday, January 9 with a focus not yet seen by Hamilton.
“The guys were extremely focused from the moment they got on the bus and it showed. They were pretty tight in the first quarter,” says Hamilton.
Despite facing a tricky 1-3-1 zone defense, the Titans proceeded to run through their offense and managed to build a 22-7 lead by halftime.
“Our offense was a little messy but its always messy against that kind of defense,” says Hamilton.
The Titans continued to dominate in the third quarter and then eased off the throttle in the fourth quarter to cruise to a 43-29 win.
“It was a good game for us,” says Hamilton.
While Quinn Winter led the team in scoring with 18 points, freshman David Wasinger had his best game of the season with 10 points and 10 rebounds.
“David had a breakout game,” says Hamilton. “He’s started to figure out the varsity speed.”
Full of confidence, the Titans put together a solid practice before heading into the San Luis Valley for their first league game of the season against the Sargent Farmers. The Titans’ league has six teams vying for supremacy and Sargent is always in the mix year in and year out.
Nevertheless, Hamilton hoped for the best out of his team with Winter and Wasinger clicking and the rest of the team moving closer to their roles on their court.
Unfortunately, that failed to pan out as the Farmers bring an up-tempo game from the opening tip. Adding insult to injury, the Titans suffered some foul trouble early and the game just continued to get away from them as time wore on.
While the Titans managed Sargent’s press relatively easily, once they set up in the half court, they fell apart.
“We struggled to get any execution out of our offense,” says Hamilton. “When teams pressure us like that, it throws our timing off and we get flustered.”
After scoring just four points in the first quarter, the Titans regrouped to score 11 points in the second led by a seven-point effort from Winter.
Still, with two starters out due to foul trouble and injury, the Titans could not hold off the Sargent attack and were down 32-15 at halftime.
The game continued along those same lines with the Titans eventually falling 55-28.
“It’s pretty simple, they executed and we didn’t.” says Hamilton. “We just couldn’t score on a consistent basis.”
Winter led the team with 14 points and nine rebounds and Tommy Rainville had a stellar effort in the paint with 11 boards.
“We actually outrebounded them,” says Hamilton. “We still have trouble shooting the ball.”
The Titans return to mighty Mt. Olympus this Friday to host the Center Vikings.
“It’s going to be really intense but that’s what we need to work on,” says Hamilton. “I’m still waiting for that moment when they put it all together. I don’t feel like we’re that far off. We’re close.”
The games start at 3:30 p.m. with the boys varsity slated to tip off at 6:30 p.m.
