The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Home games Thursday and Friday at 7 p.m.
By Than Acuff
Hopes were high as the Crested Butte Titans boys’ basketball team headed to Grand Junction on Saturday, January 17 to face the Caprock Academy Eagles. The Titans were coming off one of their best efforts of the season just a week before against Sanford, the top team in 2A, and had a week of practices to prepare for the Eagles.
“We were expecting a game with a lot of pressure but coming off the Sanford game we figured we could handle the pressure,” says coach Mike Bacani.
The game opened as hoped for Crested Butte as they jumped out to a 6-0 lead before Caprock called a timeout to regroup and switch gears as they came back onto the floor with a press that upended the Titans. The switch forced Crested Butte into numerous turnovers, and the Eagles closed the first quarter with a run and maintained their momentum through the second quarter to go up 33-15 by halftime. Not only that, but the Titans lost starting point guard Isaac Jennings toward the end of the second quarter to an ankle injury, further exacerbating their issues.
“They started their press and we just weren’t able to manage it,” says Bacani. “We had 19 turnovers in the first half and you’re not going to beat anybody with that many turnovers.”
Crested Butte took time during the break to shake off the startling circumstances and made a point of focusing on the opening minutes of the third quarter to climb back into contention. The paradigm shift worked at first as the Titans cut into the Caprock lead with John Mitchell, Bennett Crabtree and Owen Pugh all scoring points, but 10 points was as close as the Titans would get as Caprock called a timeout and ramped up their effort to rebuild their lead.
“Their lead went from 10 to 16 points right away,” says Bacani.
Foul trouble then hit the Titans as they were forced to sit another starter for much of the second half and the Eagles would maintain their lead through to the final whistle for the 54-37 win. Blake Bacani ended up leading the Titans with 11 points, nine from three-point range; Jennings scored eight before his injury sidelined him and Crabtree scored six points and had four blocks on the afternoon.
“Bennett played a really good game, we just couldn’t get it to him,” says Mike. “We were short-handed, and it just wore on us. I think we underestimated their pressure.”
The Titans have three games in three days now, two of which are league games, as they host Hayden on Thursday, January 23 at 7 p.m., Center on Friday at 7 p.m. and then head to Trinidad on Saturday.
“It’d be nice to have a couple of ‘gimmies’ to get our feet back under us but our league is so tough,” says Mike. “I’d really like to come out of it with wins, and if not, at least being really competitive.”
