With a great, successful regular season, the Quartz Hill Boys’ Varsity basketball team advanced to the CIF playoffs. With a 8-6 record in the league, and a 13-10 overall record, the Rebels were able to take third place, allowing them to enter the playoffs. Although the Quartz Hill Rebels fought until the very end, they came up short and lost in the first round of the playoffs.

Despite the fact that many of this year’s Varsity boys were sophomores and players who had never been to the playoffs, this was a great experience for the first-time players. The painful feeling of losing in the first round will allow the players to develop and be prepared for next year’s season. However, for our seniors, that was the last game of their high school season, and hopefully they use this loss in a positive way to succeed in college.

During the playoff game, Quartz Hill started off well with a 7-0 run; however, Flintridge Prep did not back down. After Flintridge Prep started to take over, the Quartz Hill Rebels began to find themselves in a hole. With many wide open lay-ups missed and unnecessary shots taken, the Rebels had a very hard time getting relaxed. With a difficult first quarter, the Rebels were able to get their momentum back and finish the first half down only by five points.

Just as Quartz Hill began to get back into the game, a point guard from Flintridge Prep began to hit many three pointers in a row. With Quartz Hill’s defense not being able to stop this player, Flintridge Prep went on a sixteen point streak, giving them a huge advantage. At this point, Quartz Hill had no other choice than to keep playing hard and not give up. By the fourth quarter of the game, Flintridge Prep outscored the Quartz Hill Rebels by 7 points and had a 68-47 victory.

After the game, many of the Quartz Hill players realized that there has to be a change in the way they played. One player that wished to remain anonymous stated, “We need to have a focused mindset on starting the game strong and getting a big lead. Also, we lacked defensively and played a lot of one-on-one ball instead of playing out spread offense.” The players realized that encouraging one another is the key to their success. Erick Balacazar explained, “I would like to see more competitiveness out on the floor and cheering one another to become better.”

Quartz Hill will learn from all of the mistakes the players made in the past game. After losing in the first round of the playoffs, many players realized that they must work harder. Soon, Quartz Hill will be back for next year’s season as a more developed and competitive team.