Basketball Recap: Trinity Catholic Takes Loss Despite Strong Efforts from Julian Mendez and Mike Neal

It's hard to turn regular season success into postseason wins, a fact Trinity Catholic can now relate to. They fell to the St. Joseph Academy Flashes 55-50. If the Celtics were looking for revenge after losing 51-30 to them when the teams met back in January of 2021, then they'll just have to keep looking.

Mike Neal

Points (Career)

02/05/25 @ St. Joseph Academy	14
12/19/24 vs Wildwood	13
12/17/24 @ Mount Dora	12
01/24/25 @ Dunnellon	11
12/20/24 vs Umatilla	10

Despite the loss, Trinity Catholic had strong showings from Mike Neal, who dropped a double-double on 14 points and 12 boards, and Julian Mendez, who posted 11 points in addition to five assists and five rebounds. The dominant performance gave Neal a new career-high in points. Another player making a difference was Jadiel Jimenez, who put up nine points and eight rebounds.

Even though they lost, Trinity Catholic smashed the offensive glass and finished the game with 16 offensive rebounds. They easily outclassed their opponents in that department as St. Joseph Academy only pulled down seven offensive boards.

Multiple players turned in solid performances to lead St. Joseph Academy to victory, but perhaps none more so than Josh Wolff, who earned 13 points and three steals. Michael Shaw was another key player, going 6 of 12 on his way to 13 points along with seven boards and three steals.

Trinity Catholic dropped their record down to 10-15 with the defeat, which was their sixth straight on the road. As for St. Joseph Academy, they are on a roll lately: they've won eight of their last ten games, which provided a nice bump to their 14-8 record this season.

Trinity Catholic does not have any more games scheduled as of now. As for St. Joseph Academy, they didn't take long to hit the court again: they've already played their next contest, a 90-81 loss against P.K. Yonge on the 7th.