ST. HELENA — Brandon White”s put-back basket at the buzzer lifted the Clear Lake High School varsity boys” basketball team to a thrilling 54-52 win over the Calistoga Wildcats on Saturday in the consolation championship game of the St. Helena Tournament.
Calistoga pulled even at 52 on a 3-pointer with 10 seconds remaining. The Cardinals (2-1) advanced the ball to halfcourt with five seconds before taking a timeout. When play resumed, junior guard Armando Martinez pulled up for a shot from inside the key but missed.
“It was a pretty good shot,” Clear Lake coach Ken Hook said of Martinez, who finished with 11 points.
While Calistoga was in perfect position to grab the defensive rebound, White reached over a Wildcats player and tipped the ball in as the buzzer went off, breaking the 52-all tie.
Calistoga took a 37-33 lead into the final quarter against Clear Lake, which had its work cut out against a Wildcats defense that forced the Cardinals to do some quick thinking on the court.
“They scramble on defense and double-team you all over the court,” Hook said. “They force you to play in the open court and we made some nice plays in the open court.”
Jameson Holder scored 10 of his team-leading 16 points in the fourth quarter for the Cardinals, who also helped themselves at the free-throw line by hitting 13 of 14 shots, including seven of eight in the final period.
“We went 6-for-20 in our first game,” Hook said.
Clear Lake center Kory Hook added nine points and was named to the All-Tournament team.
In other tournament action Saturday:
International 62, Upper Lake 60
At Boonville, one night after playing their worst game of the season, the Cougars played what coach Forrest Stogner called their “best game” even though they came up short against International of San Francisco in the consolation round of the Redwood Classic.
“Best game we”ve played this year,” Stogner said. “If we can play like this all the time, we”ll be fine.”
Upper Lake”s zone defense kept the Cougars (1-3) in the game, according to Stogner.
“One thing my team hasn”t done in my two seasons here is play good zone defense but we played very well in a zone defense the entire game.”
Free-throw shooting down the stretch ultimately cost the Cougars, who struggled at the line, going 4-for-11. Two missed free throws on a shooting foul with 1:30 remaining in the game allowed International to maintain a slim lead.
Jacob Widener scored a team-best 20 points, including four 3-pointers, and Kyle Coleman added 15 points and 10 rebounds.
Middletown 54, Rio Vista 38
At St. Helena, All-Tourn-ament selection Tyler Hunt scored a team-leading 21 points to go along with a team-best 18 rebounds as Middletown beat Rio Vista in the seventh-place game of the St. Helena Tournament.
Hunt average 19 points and 15 rebounds during the three-game tourney.
Jake Strickler added 13 points and Andrew Djernes had six points and six blocks for Middletown (1-2).
