Santa Cruz Warriors Lose to Austin Spurs on Back-to-Back
The Santa Cruz Warriors lost the second game of a back-to-back series with the Austin Spurs.
SANTA CRUZ, Calif. — The Santa Cruz Warriors suffered a 98-87 loss at Kaiser Permanente Arena on Saturday night, failing to go undefeated on their back-to-back series with the Austin Spurs.
Once again, Elliot Williams led all scorers with 26 points, adding in 11 assists and five rebounds. Verdell Jones III finished with 18 points after going 0-for-6 in the first three quarters, dropping in five three-pointers in the fourth quarter as Santa Cruz attempted to close the gap late. Juwan Staten recorded 10 points on the night.
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Cameron Bairstow, still on assignment from the Chicago Bulls, paced the Spurs with 17 points, in addition to Cady Lalanne, who scored 17 off the bench. They would be joined by four other players in double-digit scoring, including Orlando Johnson (16), Keifer Sykes (10), Deshaun Thompson (12), and former Golden State Warriors training camp invite, Jarell Eddie (12).
Similar to Friday night’s game, the Spurs would go on a significant second quarter run, ending the first half with a 9-point lead. They would continue to lead throughout the rest of the game, pushing their lead to as many as 24 points. The Warriors would attempt a comeback in the fourth quarter, but the Spurs would remain resolute in their late-game execution.
Looking at the stats, the numbers that really stick out are the 14 offensive rebounds Santa Cruz allowed, which resulted in 19 second chance points for Austin. Talking to Coach Casey Hill after the game, he made note of how significant a role the battle of the boards played on Saturday night.
“I don’t think the total rebounds was the issue, I think it’s the type of rebounds they were getting,” Hill said. “They had 19 second chance points on 14 offensive rebounds and…that was a problem. It was a problem last night. Obviously we were a little bit better last night. We just got to do a better job boxing out.”
Another thing Coach Hill pointed out was how good Austin is at swinging the ball from side to side, forcing the defense to shift constantly across the floor. Hill said Friday he hopes his team can do the same in terms of moving the ball and not settling for isolations, but he admitted Saturday that a combination of poor health and distrust has the team struggling to keep the ball moving.
“We’re not there yet,” Hill said when asked how well he thought the team did swinging the ball Saturday night.
“We’re also not healthy. We don’t have our full roster here. So there’s a couple factors contributing to that, and that’s one of them. A couple others are just some trust factors that I think we’re still working through.”
In terms of health, Santa Cruz has certainly not been as healthy as their affiliate in Oakland. Xavier Henry and Daniel Nwaelele have yet to make their regular season debuts, Ronnie Brewer has missed the past five games, and Darington Hobson was inactive Saturday night due to what was reported as a minor injury.
Santa Cruz now moves to 4-3 on the season. They’ll have quite a while to get healthy and practice moving the ball before their next game at home, which will be on Dec. 4 against the Texas Legends.
If you missed Saturday’s game, you can watch the recorded video below: