ALAMEDA — Lou Richie has reached the highest of highs while leading the Bishop O’Dowd boys basketball program. He has seen the view that comes from winning a state championship at the top level.
But, the coach said, no team he’s had is quite like the collective group he has now.
When O’Dowd completed an undefeated league season Friday night with a 54-41 victory on the road over Alameda — a record that was not a slam dunk given how the Dragons started — Richie was asked what he likes about this team.
“They won’t want me to say this,” he said, “but it’s the best bunch of kids I’ve ever coached. Early in the season, they took that as a knock on their athletic ability.
“It wasn’t. They’re truly the best kids, the best student-athletes I’ve been around in 20 years. We have I think seven kids with above a 4.0 GPA. What we were banking on is if they’re the smartest kids and they follow direction in the classroom better than anyone else, we just have to map out what they have to get better at from an intellectual perspective.”
The response has turned around a season that started roughly in November and December — four losses in the first five games — but is pointing straight up now. The Dragons will enter the North Coast Section playoffs next week on a 12-game winning streak.
“They responded by watching more film, cutting up film,” Richie said. “They’ve improved on their defense. They’ve improved on their rebounding. They’ve improved on their passing. They’ve improved on their basketball IQ. They’ve improved on their free-throw shooting. They’ve improved on their two-point shooting. You name it, every facet they’ve gotten better, and they’re going to have to continue to get better.”
Will the turnaround earn the Dragons an invitation to the NCS’s six-team Open Division?
A committee will determine the bracket Sunday.
“I told our team we’re not even going to put any energy into that because we can’t control it,” Richie said.
The Dragons are the only team to capture an NCS Open title. They won the inaugural championship in 2020 but couldn’t defend the title last spring because the section didn’t have playoffs.
If O’Dowd doesn’t make the Open, it’ll probably be a high seed in Division I.
The Dragons finished the regular season 15-5 overall and 12-0 in the West Alameda County Conference’s Foothill League.
Having already clinched the league championship, Richie went with a young starting lineup Friday, hoping to give his regulars more rest after a wild double-overtime victory over Piedmont on Wednesday.
O’Dowd led 11-4 after the first quarter but trailed 23-21 at halftime.
“We’re a much deeper team now because we played the younger kids,” Richie said. “What the older kids learned tonight is that they didn’t play well in the first half because they were trying to force stuff. Let the game come to you.”
O’Dowd scored the final six points of the third quarter to grab a four-point advantage and eight of the first 10 points of the fourth quarter to take command.
Cameron Brown, who didn’t start, scored 13 of his 15 points after halftime to lead the Dragons. Myles De Los Santos Moore chipped in with 12 points.
Nick Rondenet led Alameda with 13 points.
Alameda fell to 15-7, 8-4.
Source: www.mercurynews.com