ATHERTON, Calif. — After months of seeing the same teams, Tuesday’s CIF Division I opener allowed the Sacred Heart Prep Gators to finally see some fresh faces.
The lack of familiarity worked to their benefit as the trio of Aidan Braccia, Kevin Carney and Emmer Nichols nearly outscored Dougherty Valley’s entire roster in an 83-70 win.
“It changes the dynamic of how we play,” Braccia said of facing a team unfamiliar with the Gators’ attack. “It felt great to get up and down the court a little more than we have in past games.”
The favorite to win the West Bay Athletic League and a lock for the CCS Open Division since mid-December, Sacred Heart Prep (24-4) hardly saw an opponent over the past two months that hadn’t been breaking down film for weeks. Against a Wildcats team that only had 48 hours’ notice to prepare, the Gators were able to finally strut their stuff.
“Having a little more freedom of movement for some of our guys, they relished that opportunity,” SHP head coach Tony Martinelli said.
Braccia scored a game-high 28, making all 12 of his free throw attempts. Nichols, who was held to four points in a CCS Open Division loss to Riordan, had 21 points and nine rebounds, and Carney finished with 18.
“When Emmer scores in double-digits, we don’t lose,” Martinelli said. “Not to put a lot of pressure on him, but it shows how tough it is to beat us when he’s scoring, Braccia’s scoring and Carney’s scoring.”
Nichols had 14 points by halftime, slashing to the hoop repeatedly against a Wildcats team that had both size and speed, but no player with the combination of the two to match the 6-foot-5 senior.
"Not only are they big, they’re quick,” Dougherty Valley head coach Mike Hansen said. “Our physical guys aren’t quick enough, and then you run guards at ‘em and now you’re in trouble height-wise.”
SHP closed the first half on a 15-3 run, starting with the second of Braccia’s four 3-pointers. Jake York and RJ Stephens combined for six points off the bench and Nichols drove to the hoop in the final seconds to give the top-seeded Gators a 39-25 lead headed into the break. Dougherty Valley (21-7) trimmed an 18-point lead down to eight in the third on a Chris Fallgren corner three, but Carney answered with the final five points of the quarter, first scoring on a baseline drive, then hitting a pull-up three just shy of the buzzer to put SHP up 58-45.
A 10-2 run in the fourth extended the lead to 21 and put the game away, with 6-foot-7 Sam Norris hitting a three and Nichols scoring on another drive. York’s offensive rebound set up a Braccia 3-pointer, and the Belmont commit made a pair of free throws with 4:56 left for a 72-51 advantage.
Ryan Beasley led the Wildcats with 27, finishing one point shy of Braccia and going 11-for-12 from the line, but Dougherty Valley simply couldn’t keep up without Connor Sevilla, who was sidelined by a deep thigh bruise that kept him out of six of his team’s final seven games.
“Batman has Robin, and it helps when Ryan’s got Colin with him, just to take some pressure off,” Hansen said. “You take one dynamic scorer away from us and it makes us a little easier to guard.”
Both Beasley and Sevilla are juniors and younger siblings of brothers who have helped Dougherty Valley ascend the ranks in the East Bay. Even without Sevilla, the Wildcats started three juniors and a sophomore. Of their six seniors, only one started and three saw minutes off the bench, including Rahul Srinivasaragavan, who scored 11 in his final game with the program.
“His older brother played for us, so Srini’s been with us since fifth grade,” Hansen said. “He’s all-in and his parents are all-in.”
The 6-foot-1 guard hit a pair of early threes and crossed up Braccia with a filthy spin move for the penultimate basket of his career. Despite being overshadowed by Beasley and Sevilla, Srinivasaragavan and the other seniors were never bothered by their roles.
“They’re Dougherty guys. They just fight. The same thing they do every day at 3:30. They just compete and get better. They just wanted to be part of something special,” Hansen said. “First-ever team in school history to get to an NCS title game, so they’ve taken this endeavor we’re on further than anyone else, and now we’ve gotta keep building on it.”
While the Wildcats’ returning core should merit a bevy of invitations to prestigious tournaments and showcases in the 2022-23 season, that time is now for the Gators, who start four seniors.
“We sat down and said we have to play every game like it’s our last,” Nichols said.
That mentality was exemplified on the defensive end, where the Gators rotated a mix of JP Kerrigan, Sachit Sinha and York on Beasley. They held him three points below his season average and 16 below the mark he posted in Saturday’s NCS Division 1 Championship loss to Clayton Valley.
“Every two to three minutes, we put a fresh defender on Beasley, and he got a little winded. We told guys, if you’re guarding him, you’re pretty much a defensive player only. Your focus is him,” Martinelli said. “He actually came out of the game for a good stretch in the second quarter. Having him out of the game got our offense going a little bit.”
Also a top defender, Beasley was on the bench for a significant portion of the 15-3 run that gave the Gators separation in what had been a back-and-forth game to that point. The lead changed hands seven times in a first quarter where the teams emerged deadlocked at 18 after Beasley’s elbow jumper through contact at the buzzer, and Aadi Malali’s layup off one of Jordan Silva’s five assists had the Wildcats within two at the 4:31 mark of the second quarter before SHP took off.
Hansen emptied the bench down 15 with 1:43 to go, allowing seniors Ashmit Gaba and Keoni Hurskin to finish their careers on the court. Silva finished with 10 points, but Sevilla’s absence allowed SHP to key in on Colin Tan, who went scoreless.
If the Gators are going to continue their run against eighth-seeded Oakland Tech on Thursday, they’re going to need more big performances from Nichols. They’re 2-4 in games where he’s scored under 10 points and 20-0 when he’s reached double-digits.
“Against Riordan, I wasn’t aggressive enough,” Nichols said. “Coach Martinelli came up to me and said this team would provide me an opportunity to attack and have some mismatches.”
