<\/p>\n
Two up-and-coming teams opened the Moore League season with a thriller, as the Lakewood Lancers battled back from a seven-point deficit to overtake and beat the Cabrillo Jaguars for a 66-56 home victory on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
It was a game of runs, as Lakewood jumped out to an early 12-4 lead in the first quarter, but Cabrillo\u2019s depth and quickness gave them a 34-31 halftime lead as senior guard Christian Verdugo beat the buzzer with a three-pointer. Cabrillo began the second half with a hot start as well, but it was all Lancers from there on out.<\/p>\n
The Lancers\u2019 physical defense took a toll on Cabrillo\u2019s speed, and some speedy drives by guard Victor Jones came during a 17-5 Lakewood run that would seal the win. Cabrillo\u2019s backcourt-oriented offense stalled when forced into a slower pace, and the Lancers made few mistakes down the stretch. Jonathon Snagg led all scorers with 18, while Dominique Lanier had 12 and Jared Garber added 10 for the Lancers.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was kind of uneven, we opened and we closed,\u201d said Lakewood head coach Matt Ruiz. \u201cI really liked our competitiveness. We made some mistakes I didn\u2019t like but that\u2019s alright, we played through it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lakewood got plenty of timely baskets \u2013 such as a clutch baseline jumper from Snagg for a 57-52 advantage \u2013 that kept Cabrillo at bay, but it was the tough interior defense that stifled a very potent Jaguar offense. The Lancers tightened up at every position on the defensive end, and neither Verdugo nor backcourt-mate Tony Bell were able to get into an offensive rhythm.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think their size wore us down in the second half,\u201d said Cabrillo coach Jim nielsen. \u201cLakewood\u2019s an extremely physical team, I give them a lot of credit. What we have to do is work hard and continue playing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lakewood gets the victory and begins the Moore League season with an exciting start, and both teams look to play the role of spoiler against opponents that have received more preseason attention. The Lancers boast toughness, interior size and athleticism, while Cabrillo stands at 9-3 on the season and has some of the fastest players in Long Beach. If both teams can stay focused and healthy, don\u2019t be surprised to see these two squads playing the underdog role this postseason.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Lakewood Lancers battled back from a seven-point deficit to beat the Cabrillo Jaguars for a 66-56 home victory on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-2452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2452\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2452"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=2452"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=2452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}