Preview: King Wolves vs. Central Catholic Raiders
The King Wolves will wrap up 2023 with a road trip to face off against the Central Catholic Raiders at 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday. The matchup should be an exciting one, as these teams are ranked near one another in California (King is ranked 280th, while Central Catholic is ranked 268th).
King pushed their score all the way to 60 on Wednesday, but even that wasn't enough to win. They took a 69-60 hit to the loss column at the hands of Villa Park.
Despite the loss, King had strong showings from Jeremiah Davis, who dropped a double-double on 15 points and 13 rebounds, and Mathias Tinker, who scored 17 points along with five rebounds. Those 13 rebounds set a new season-high mark for him. The team also got some help courtesy of Kevin Fincher, who scored nine points.
Central Catholic has made a habit of sweeping their opponents off the court, having now won three matches by 25 points or more this season. Everything went their way against Patterson on Thursday as Central Catholic made off with a 64-39 win.
Central Catholic can attribute much of their success to Wesley Payne, who scored 15 points along with six rebounds and three steals, and Jordan Magana, who went 6 for 8 from beyond the arc en route to 21 points and 4 assists. That makes it five consecutive games in which Magana has scored at least 25% of Central Catholic's points. Another player making a difference was Tyler Wentworth, who scored 14 points along with eight rebounds.
King now has a losing record at 8-9. As for Central Catholic, their win bumped their record up to 7-3.
King came up short against Central Catholic in their previous matchup back in December of 2018, falling 50-43. Can King avenge their defeat or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.
