Turlock Christian varsity boys basketball’s historic season came to an end on Wednesday as the Eagles fell to Valley Christian in the first round of the NorCal Division VI Championships. The season was highlighted by the team earning the first section title for boys basketball in school history.
“I told the team one game does not define our season,” said head coach Daniel Motz. “At the end of the day we have to look back and see what we accomplished. It’s been a whirlwind of emotions for everybody this past week after winning the section championships.”
The game started off hot with the Eagles crashing the offensive boards and getting second chance opportunities to take the lead. The Vikings settled down and got their offense rolling to take the lead. TC was down 7-14 after the first quarter.
Valley Christian didn’t let up at the start of the second quarter and took an almost 20-point lead. The Eagles kept fighting though, and were led back by the inside work of junior Caleb Comfort and the shooting of senior Shadon Boswell. They were able to cut the deficit and go into the half down 23-39.
TC continued their aggressiveness and they were able to cut the lead down to eight. Comfort was able to stop everything at the rim, but the Vikings were able to knock down their three pointers to keep the Eagles at bay. Boswell was knocking down threes of his own to keep his team in it, but Valley Christian kept answering back to go into the final quarter up 40-57.
“We got too far into a deficit in the first half,” said Motz. “They were getting easy buckets in transition and at moments they were looking a little lost. But they were able to do a better job in the second half.”
Knowing they were going to have to take chances to complete the comeback, TC was very aggressive starting the quarter. The Vikings started to settle though and kept knocking down their shots to never put the game in doubt. With about two minutes left both teams brought out their reserves and TC ended up falling 61-75.
Some of the standout performances were Comfort, who had 18 points, 11 rebounds and six blocks, and Boswell who finished with 23 points.
Turlock Christian finished the season with a 21–11 record overall and a 7-3 record in league play, which earned them a second-place finish along with the section title.
“These kids have heart, they fought all season,” said Motz. “We’ve gone through stretches of winning eight games and also stretches of losing eight games. Our heart and determination didn’t falter at all. That should give you an idea about the heart of this team.
