It would be unethical, or at least lazy, to just reprint our last preview, right? Let’s assume so. Many things about how Troy matches up with Poly are the same as their last meeting, in the CIF semifinals—Troy still shoots a lot, they’re still short, and Poly will likely still try to exploit their height advantage to plenty of points in the paint. But plenty has changed since then, too. For one thing, Poly lost to Cajon, exposing a weakness with their outside shooting that they’ve largely corrected in the first two rounds of state.
However, in the Jackrabbits’ last game, against Stockdale, they let their opponent go on a run to start the second half when the Stockdale press created a lot of Poly turnovers. The turnovers could be a problem, says Poly coach Carl Buggs. “You know, we won that Troy game, by opening up a big lead after the first quarter—but they outscored us through the second, third, and fourth quarter. The majority of that was from turnovers—we went through a period where we went four straight possessions turning the ball over, where we didn’t even get a shot off.” On the night, Poly turned the ball over 26 times, about double their average for the rest of the postseason.
The question of the evening, other than how well Poly can contain Alex Sanchez (something they were largely successful doing in the first game), will be how well the ‘Rabbits can move through the Warriors’ press, and whether they can effectively break their press without turning the ball over. “We’ve worked on it since the Stockdale game,” says Buggs. “Against Stockdale, they caught us by surprise a little [by not pressing until the second half]. Instead of running our normal press break, we tried to do it too much on our own with dribbling.”
The other biggest question mark for a Poly team that was up 15 at the half but saw their lead cut to single digits in the fourth is whether or not they can maintain the kind of intensity they’ve shown in the first half. “I worry that we might be lacking that killer instinct,” says Buggs. “We get a big lead, and then we lose our edge.”
Sustaining focus will be an important factor in tonight’s game—whose winner moves on to play in the regional championship at UCLA on Saturday. But so will the press break, and containing Sanchez. If the ‘Rabbits are successful there, and can keep the Warriors from getting too many second-chance shots on those long rebounds, they might get another shot this weekend at the Cajon team that beat them in the CIF finals. Of course, against a team as good as Troy, they can’t look too far ahead either. The Warriors have only lost two games this season…and since the most recent was to Poly, they’ll definitely have revenge on their mind tonight in the Ron Palmer Pavilion at 7pm.