American River College men’s basketball is now at four straight losses after being taken down by Sacramento City College 98-84 as it struggles to come together and execute.
The team was in a good rhythm to start the game but soon took a turn for the worst.
ARC guard Marcelas Perry made a 3-pointer on the first play of the game, but SCC was quick to rally back and start a good back and forth for the first two minutes of the game.
SCC was unstoppable from beyond the arc, with Bret Lynch shooting 5 of 8 on 3-pointers during the game.
With 12 minutes still left in the first half, Sac City was leading by 10 and playing some seriously tough defense inside the arc, killing ARC’s ability to get any points up.
Marcelas Perry, however, played a hot game and was able to drop in some 3-pointers that really helped keep the team going and get past the solid SCC defense.
Perry went 3 for 5 for the night.
“We played hard, and I did what I could for the team whether it be on offense or defense,” Perry said.
One thing that really plagued the team was the amount of turnovers they allowed, 18 total for the whole game.
“With 18 turnovers, if you cut that in half that’s nine extra shots you get, and if you make four of them that’s eight points maybe nine, ten points,” said head coach Mark Giorgi, “that’s the difference of the game.”
ARC finished off the first half down by 12 and some serious anger and frustration could be seen and felt between both players and coaches.
ARC came into the second half looking more determined and ready to play, starting off with an amazing scoring drive that brought their 12 point gap down to four.
Coach Giorgi’s second half plan was to “take care of the ball and try to stop them (SCC).”
The plan seemed to be working, as SCC was shut down by ARC’s defense and had a harder time making threes.
It also seemed like ball control was much improved for the most part and ARC was able to get some more points up from Perry, Austin Lobo, and Francisco Lopez.
But SCC was still able to find a way through ARC’s defense and continued to increase its lead.
Things continued to get worse for ARC as multiple personal fouls were called on Lobo and Lopez, allowing Sac City to get some free points up and make ARC’s quest to get back in the game even harder.
ARC continued to fight, but just weren’t able to put anything together and at the last 30 seconds of the game with the score 91-84 and Sac City sealed the deal by dropping in one last three to make it 94-84.
The team was in low morale but some players like Austin Lobo were already looking forward to get back to work and improving. “I’m going to come tomorrow prepared and ready to get better and hopefully all my teammates are in the same mindset.”
