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OAKLAND — Try as they might, the Dougherty Valley coaching staff could not get a traveling call. They begged and pleaded and the cries only came with more frequency as the game continued.
Bishop O’Dowd’s wings were cutting and slashing and, by the end of it, doing it effectively enough to get and-1s — not traveling calls. The third-seeded Dragons opened up a 23-3 lead over the No. 6 Wildcats and coasted to an 86-60 win in the first round of the North Coast Section Open Division boys basketball playoffs.
“We’ve always said as coaches, once we start yelling at the refs, it’s usually because we can’t coach anymore,” Dougherty Valley head man Mike Hansen said.
In O’Dowd’s opening onslaught, which lasted the first six minutes of play, every starter scored at least one basket. On the other side, the most notable starter was the one who was missing. Senior Robby Beasley, the Wildcats’ leading scorer who will play at the University of Montana next season, hobbled into the Laney College gymnasium on crutches, with a brace on his right knee. He will get surgery to repair a torn meniscus and miss the rest of the season, Hansen confirmed.
Beasley re-injured his knee last week against Dublin. Although he also missed four games earlier in the season, it left Hansen and his staff scrambling to prepare for a playoff run without their star player.
Bishop O’Dowd coach Lou Richie saw an opening.
“Without Robby, they don’t want to play from behind,” he said. “If you look at the last game against Dublin without Robby, they tried to slow it down and have less possessions. We wanted to have more possessions.”
They were able to limit Dougherty’s transition game with a strong presence on the boards, led by senior forward Monty Bowser, who collected a game-high nine rebounds to go with 18 points.
Bowser emphatically opened O’Dowd’s largest lead of the game by slamming home a breakaway lob from junior guard Marsalis Roberson, who chipped in 17 points and another pair of dimes.
“We have some guys who can fly and get up,” Richie said. “That changes the momentum of the game. The dunks, a lot of coaches say a dunk is just two points. It’s not. When any kid dunks, it’s like 10.”
Hansen doesn’t believe the high-flying act affected his team. But he admitted, especially without Beasley, the Wildcats were a bit stunned by the Dragons’ athleticism.
“It’s almost like you have to realize you can play with it at first,” Hansen said. “We came out and I think we doubted we could, so they kind of jumped on us.”
Still, the absence of Beasley? “That’s not the difference in this game.”
“But,” Hansen added, “it’s a difference probably going into other games.”
Beasley’s younger brother, Ryan, a freshman, has proven to be a more-than-adequate substitute. He tied for a game-high with 18 points, one game after he scored 22 points.
By virtue of making the inaugural NCS Open Division, Dougherty locked in its spot in the NorCal regionals, though it won’t play again for nearly two weeks.
The win Thursday night was O’Dowd’s 15th in a row. It hasn’t lost since the beginning of league play. Its margin of victory over the past eight games? More than 22 points.
At one stage this season, the Dragons sat at 5-7 — after playing one of the toughest schedules in Northern California, that is.
“People definitely had questions,” Richie said. “There was a lot of whispering going on.”
Whether it comes in their NCS semifinal matchup — vs. No. 2 Salesian at Pinole Valley HS on Wednesday night — or in the NorCal regionals after that, the Dragons are now just waiting for a challenge.
“Our true test will come,” he said, “in whatever game we play and get behind in.”
