This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Sports

Dolphins' Upset Bid Falls Short

The Palisades High boys' basketball team nearly upsets Westchester.

Senior Night was all that and more on Wednesday at the Palisades High gym.

First, head coach James Paleno introduced his five seniors to the packed crowd. Then, as is the boys' basketball program's long-standing tradition, they went out and started their last regular season home game. 

The seniors and the rest of their teammates gave an inspired effort for four quarters, but in the end they came up three points short against defending City Section and Division I state champion Westchester, losing 58-55 when Dominick Brown's three-pointer hit the back of the rim and rattled out with two seconds left.

Find out what's happening in Brentwoodwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"I'm always looking for my shot, so I wasn't afraid," said Brown, a junior transfer from Westchester who desperately wanted to beat his former team. "It's a shot I take 100 times a day and I got a clean look, it just didn't go down."

The play was designed for Adam [Griffin] or Kahlil [Johnson] out of the corner, but they defended it well," Paleno said. "But Dominick is capable of hitting that shot and we have confidence in him shooting it."

Find out what's happening in Brentwoodwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Brown played on Westchester's JV team last year but knows the Comets' varsity players well and even hangs out with them on weekends.

"This is one of the hardest losses I've taken," Brown said. "This game hurts the most. I really wanted to win this and we were right there."

The game was especially disheartening for the Dolphins' seniors, who will graduate without ever having beaten Westchester--unless of course Palisades were to upset the Comets in the City playoffs, which begin next week.

"The ceremony beforehand was great, but I really wasn't thinking at all about whether this would be my last home game or not," said guard Malcolm Creer, who last week signed his letter of intent to play football at Colorado. "What I know about this team is that when we're playing the better teams we bring our level of intensity up and we did that today."

Donovan Johnson, who scored a game-high 30 points in the Dolphins' five point loss to the Comets in the first round of  Western League play, again led Palisades with 19 points, fellow junior Kahlil Johnson had 11 points, senior Everett Osborne had 10 points and senior Ilya Ilyayev added nine.

"I was very proud of our team because when we got behind late we didn't roll over," Paleno said. "Those guys are the defending state champions and the second-best team in the City [behind Taft] and it came down to one shot."

Palisades (15-12 overall, 8-3 in league) outscored the Comets 18-10 in the second quarter to take a 27-26 lead into halftime, but Paleno was disappointed the lead wasn't bigger.

"We didn't handle the end of the first half very well at all," he said. "We were up six, they get a steal and a layup, Donovan [Johnson] gets called for an offensive foul and they hit a three-pointer with two seconds left. So instead of us being up by four, it's a one-point game." 

Josh Johnson hit a jump shot at the third-quarter buzzer to give Westchester a 43-40 lead, setting the stage for a thrilling finish.

"I think if we had taken it to overtime we would've had them worried," Paleno said. "As it is, we need to shake this off quickly because we have Uni on Friday and that's going to decide second place."

A playoff intensity existed throughout and when Creer fouled Keywhon Powns hard on his way to the basket, tempers flared, a melee ensued and two players were subsequently ejected--Palisades' Josh Burton and Westchester's Bre'lon Leverette.

"I thought Malcolm made a good hard foul.. you never want to allow easy layups, you want to make them earn it at the [foul] line," Paleno said. "The referee ruled it a flagrant, which gave them two free throws plus the ball."

Donovan Johnson's reverse layup pulled Palisades to within 53-49 with 2:17 left and when Griffin was fouled on a three-point attempt with 1:54 remaining the Dolphins and their home fans were smelling an upset. However, Griffin missed all three free throws and Josh Johnson made a layup at the other end. Creer was whistled for his fifth foul and Powns made both free throws to give the Comets a seemingly insurmountable 57-49 lead at the 1:26 mark.

Donovan Johnson brought Palisades back, scoring on a twisting layup, then scoring on a putback in traffic to pull the Dolphins within three points with 12 seconds left. The Comets turned the ball over on their next possession, giving Palisades one last chance to pull even with nine ticks remaining. Donovan Johnson dribbled the ball into the frontcourt, but he was double-teamed and made an awkward pass to Brown, who missed the slightly off-balance shot.

"Coach [Paleno] believes in us and what we can do and that gives us a lot of confidence to play up to our ability," Brown said. "When you're tight you don't play as well as when you're loose."

Free throws often make the difference in close games and this was no exception. Palisades converted just 10 of its 22 attempts while Westchester (22-6, 11-0) made good on 15 of its 20 chances at the line.

"We believe in giving our fans their money's worth," Paleno joked. Palisades did that and then some Wednesday.  

"It changes the flow for substituting a little bit, but we always let the seniors start their final home game... it's just what we do," Paleno said of Senior Night. "Next year, we'll have eight [seniors] so I don't know what we'll do."

Girls Basketball

Palisades 48, Westchester 34

Ashlie Bruner had 14 points, seven rebounds, seven assists and seven steals, Asia Smith had 11 points and 17 rebounds and Kylie Mizushima added 11 points and four steals for the visiting Dolphins (19-9, 9-2), who can clinch second place in the Western League with

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?