Peninsula Frosh/Soph Struggle Against Paramount but Still Manage to Come Away With a Win

The Peninsula Panthers Frosh/Soph Team was fresh off of a defeat at the hands of Torrance HS and they were looking to right their ship and get back into the win column against the Paramount Pirates. The Panthers came out of the gate strong and jumped to a quick 10-2 lead and then slowly the fluid offense began to become stagnant and the selfish play that had come back in the Torrance game began to appear. There were no extra passes made and everyone was trying to win the game by themselves. Easy shots were again being missed and the lack of focus started to appear as it had against Torrance. The Panthers were lucky to be leading at the end of the 1st quarter 14-6.

The 2nd quarter began and the Panthers looked like a totally different team, they were not playing defense and they gave up shot after easy shot and there was only one person trying to rebound. The other players were content to watch what was going on from the perimeter and did not try to get involved. The Panthers were outscored by the Pirates by a 2-1 margin in the 2nd quarter as Paramount came back to over take the Panthers and went into half-time with a 30-26 lead.

The Panthers came out of the half with little intensity, no showing of any desire to go and start to work again and this time the Pirates began to pull away from the Panthers. The Panthers then switched their defense on the Pirates and put on a full court press that seemed to really bother the Pirates. The Panthers exploited the sudden burst of turnovers by the Pirates and quickly closed the gap and then took a 10 lead. The lead would fluctuate between 8-14 points for the remainder of the quarter and the 3rd quarter would end with the Panthers holding a 42-33 advantage.

The 4th and final quarter began and the Panthers continued to press the Pirates and forced them into mistakes. The Panther's appeared to be ready to explode when that selfish element again began to surface and a lack of effort began on the defensive end of the floor. Soon the Pirates were pushing the Panthers around, pounding the offensive backboards and slowly began to crawl back into the game. The Panthers appeared to be struggling to hold on to the lead that they held and with less than 1 minute remaining in the 4th quarter the Panthers were clinging to a 4 point lead. The Panthers were being fouled by Paramount in order to stop the clock and to put pressure on the Panthers to win the game from the foul line. The Panthers struggled from the free throw line and could only manage 4-8 from the charity stripe in the final minute of the game. Fortunately for the Panthers the Pirates were having their own struggles with trying to put the ball in the basket. The game ended and the Panthers were very fortunate to escape with a 60-55 victory. This was the last non-league game for the Panthers who finished 10-2 heading into the Bay League competition. The Panthers will kick off the 2016 Bay League Season with a game at Mira Costa on Tuesday 1-10-17 at 4:30 PM and then they will be home on Friday 1-13-17 at 4:30 Pm to face the Morningside Monarchs.

The Panthers were led by sophomores Vinny Gallegos (14 points, 1 steal) and Wyatt Chang (14 points, 15 rebounds, 2 steals). Sophomore J (8 points, 5 rebounds, 2 steals) came off the bench. Sophomore Rhys Hershberger added 7 points, 4 rebounds, 2 steals, 2 assists in the victory.