Clear Lake Falconhoops

Falcons Close Out Season With Overtime Loss Area Playoff (Second Round) Pasadena Memorial High School Gym February 25, 2005 Clear Lake 59, Humble 62 Tonight the Clear Lake Falcons (21-14 season record coming into this game) lost a heartbreaker in overtime to the Humble Wildcats 59-62. However, the unranked Falcons made believers out of those who doubted their credentials tonight when they faced the #12 area ranked Wildcats. The game was tied four times and the lead changed four times. In the first quarter the Falcons had the right stuff as they came out smokin’ and took a 13-1 lead over the Wildcats when Scott Oswald stole the ball and drove for a layup halfway through the first quarter. At 2:27 remaining in the first quarter, the foul count was 6 and 1 in favor of the District 22 co-champion Wildcats. With two minutes remaining in the first quarter, the Wildcats were shooting 1 and 1 when the foul count went to 7 and 2. Ridiculous!! The Falcons would not be denied as they outplayed the “not-so-Humble” Wildcats to a 17-12 lead to close the first quarter. Humble scored 5 points off free throws in the first quarter. In the second quarter the Wildcats got on track and narrowed the gap and took the lead 22-24 late in the quarter. The first half closed at 24-28, Humble up by 4. In the third quarter the Falcons, with 3:08 remaining, trailed by 9 before they narrowed the gap to 1. A speedy reverse layup by Jordan Villarreal driving from the right side began Lake's comeback. One of two free throws by Kendrell Thompson, a drive down the center of the lane by Gordon Abner, two free throws by Andy Leveque, and a steal and a layup by Jordon brought it to 38-39 as the quarter completed. In this game Jordan demonstrated, offensively and defensively, why he should have played more this season. In the fourth quarter the Falcons went cold making only five of fifteen field goal attempts and hitting only three of eight free throws. Whistle happy refs dominated the first half of the quarter but good Falcon defense, lots of hustle, and some solid rebounding kept them in the game. Effective free throw shooting by Humble allowed them to gain the advantage despite scoring only two field goals in the quarter. A putback by Mark Murphy brought the crowd to its feet and the score to 47-49, Lake down by 2. Murphy, with rigorous defense and 10 rebounds in the contest, would share game imaginary MVP honors with Kendrell Thompson. A steal by Armie Lewis, who was intentionally fouled on his drive toward a left side layup, led to one point from the front end of two free throws. 48-49, Lake down by 1. Then an in-bounds pass from Armie to Gordon dazzled the crowd and put Lake ahead 50-49 when Gordon's spin move gave him a clear shot right under the left side of the hoop. Lake later pulled ahead by 2 in the waning seconds but Humble's Robert Jarvis made both free throws to tie the game with 14 seconds remaining. Jarvis hit 7 of 8 free throws in the quarter. With plenty of time (8.4 seconds) after Lake's timeout, a bad pass under the basket by Scott Oswald gave Humble one last chance to score but it failed. At the end of regulation play it was knotted at 52. Both teams were in double bonus free throw shooting. Humble made 9 of 11 from the charity stripe in the fourth quarter. In the overtime, Humble's Brodrick Hunter (#5) came alive to score 6 points (he had only scored 5 in regulation play). Humble scored first in the period on a basket and a free throw by Hunter. Clear Lake continued their excellent rebounding thanks partly to Mark Murphy, who got a putback to put it at 54-55. A free throw by the Wildcat's Hunter made it 54-56. A traveling violation by Scott gave Humble the ball and another 2. A drive to the basket by sophomore point guard Armie Lewis made it 56-58. After two offensive rebounds and putback attempts, Humble's Hunter was fouled and made another free throw. After some team struggling on our end of the court, Kendrell Thompson, on his second attempt this trip down the floor, did a "shake n bake" move on the right side and put in a beautiful jumper to bring it to 58-59. Hunter scored another 2 for Humble on a drive to the basket. 58-61. Gordon Abner was fouled on a drive to the basket and the second free throw by Gordon made it 59-61. With 14 seconds remaining Humble made one of two free throws to make it 59-62. With the clock ticking away Armie brought the ball down and passed to Justin Kurtz on the right side who drained a trey with nothing but net but a timeout had been called by the coach as Lake crossed midcourt so the basket which would have tied the game, did not count. With seven seconds remaining a last ditch attempt by Armie Lewis missed the mark. 59-62 final score. Humble made 4 of 7 free throws in the OT; Clear Lake made 1 of 2. For the game, Humble scored 23 points off free throws; Clear Lake scored 13. The old adage "you don't deserve to win when you don't make your free throws" burns when it is the last game of the season or of a high school career. The officials were comprised of one mediocre senior official and two of the worst JV officials ever seen who moved up to varsity this year. They were consistent throughout the first half, consistently bad, and seemed obviously biased against Clear Lake. In the second half they were inconsistently bad but they did not seem to be too biased against either team. They knew the mechanics of officiating well enough and their knowledge of the rules was satisfactory but that most vital element, their judgment, was often inadequate. One common trait especially of junior officials, after missing a call and the crowd getting on them, is they will more quickly make a call at the next opportunity, unfortunately usually when the ball has changed hands and moved down the court. This human characteristic makes it appear the refs are biased against a team. This is not a trait exclusive to junior refs but it is more often seen among them. Although these refs have grown significantly in the last year, they still have a long way to go. The Area playoffs are down to eight games in this 5A region and these were the best referees that could be provided. How sad is that? If it were possible to take the refs out of the game and let them scrimmage and the fouling was exactly the same, Clear Lake would have won this ball game. And if a frog had wings,... Humble now advances to the regional quarterfinals where they will meet Westfield, who defeated Clear Creek 61-60. It’s tough to beat a 12th ranked team like the Humble Wildcats (26-7) when you miss 14 free throws and shoot only 32% from the field. Despite the poor shooting, the Falcons strengths and hard work enabled them to make this a close contest instead of a blowout which some had predicted. On paper many thought Clear Lake did not belong in the playoffs. But playing a well coached team like Humble to overtime and keeping the outcome in question until the final seconds validates the high regard that many others had for this Falcon squad. Once again the message was delivered by the team, "When you play Clear Lake, you better bring your best effort, because they are always tough and they will beat you if you even think of underestimating them". This team struggled all season to realize their potential. They had too many games where the team was almost unrecognizeable because they played so inconsistently and disjointedly. When they did get it all together and fully display their talent and teamwork, they played absolutely brilliant basketball. The games with Fort Bend Marshall,(the number 1 team in the state of Texas almost the entire season) which happened to be Lake's season opener, and the Clear Brook game in the Clear Lake gym are two that come to mind. Despite the relative youth of this team, it is replete with obvious talent. Six different players shared game high point honors over the course of the season. Consistently harnessing the team's talent into a cohesive unit never quite happened but the Falcons' performances during the playoffs made converts out of many skeptics anyway. Certainly their record is no indication of how talented they are on the basketball court but sometimes that happens. This is truly a team of which we will continue to be very proud. Scoring for the Falcons: Kendrell Thompson 16 (game high), Gordon Abner 10, Mark Murphy 9 (10 rebounds), Scott Oswald 9, Jordan Villarreal 7, Armie Lewis 6 (8 rebounds), Andy Leveque 2 Score by quarter: 17-07-14-14-07 US 12-16-11-13-10 Them Score at end of each quarter: 17-24-38-52-59 US 12-28-39-52-62 Them 2’s: 14 of 38 (37%) 3’s: 6 of 24 (25%) Free throws: 13 of 28 (46%)