The Brave News

by Marcelles Williams

Last Saturday Bosco Basketball competed inside the Honda Center for the CIF Southern Section Open Division Final. The atmosphere was electric, as the St. John Bosco community cheered on their Braves in a thrilling game.

The Braves rose to the occasion in last week’s title game, jumping out to a quick 10-4 lead over the top seeded Corona Centennial Huskies in the middle of the first. They closed it out and ended the first quarter with a 16-12 lead.

Junior Jack Turner made an early impact on the game, scoring a crowd-pleasing 3-pointer and a couple layups.

“We were coming to play, and we were going to give it our all,” said Jack. “We still have unfinished business.”

Bosco led for almost all of the first half until late into the second quarter. Kade Bonam, Jack Turner and Xinyi Li were on their A-games from the jump ball, and the Braves were adamant that the Huskies wouldn’t walk off the court without a determined fight.

At halftime the score was 28-23, with the Braves trailing by five points. The game was still far from decided and tension continued to mount.

Coming out of the tunnel in the third quarter, the Braves got a strong push from sophomore guard Elzie Harrington, who scored ten points in the quarter. Elzie is one of the top sophomores in the nation and is rated as a five-star recruit for the class of 2025.

“I was trying to do anything I could to help the team,” said Elzie. “These are the type of games you play for. It doesn’t get any better than this.”

The game came down to the wire and was tied in the very last second of the game. Yet devastatingly, the Huskies intercepted a pass from Elzie and followed through to end the game on a dunk to secure a 58-56 victory over the Braves.

Bosco Basketball might not have been able to pull off the win, but they still are hopeful for the CIF State Playoffs with their sights on a match-up with another top 25 team in the country, Harvard-Westlake, who they recently defeated only two weeks ago.

The last game was played on the opponent’s turf at Harvard-Westlake, but this time the Wolverines will come to the Thunderdome. The Tribe went wild for the Braves in their last home game against St. Bernard, so fans should expect the same and more tonight.

The Braves had won 62-55 in the first game, and Elzie scored 22 points to lead the Braves to victory.

If the Braves best the Wolverines tonight, they will advance and most likely get a shot at redemption with Corona Centennial for a chance to go to the CIF State Championship game. Fans not attending the game can tune in to Spectrum Sportsnet to watch the action starting at 7:30 pm.