Big Pine is 2-8 against the Golden Eagles since November of 2016 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Thursday. The Big Pine Warriors will look to defend their home court against the Lone Pine Golden Eagles at 5:00 p.m. Both teams come into the match bolstered by wins in their previous matches.
Last Tuesday, Big Pine didn't have too much trouble with the Tigers on the road as they won 43-29.
Meanwhile, Lone Pine had already won 11 in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 30.9 points), and they went ahead and made it 12 on Tuesday. They simply couldn't be stopped as they easily beat Trona 72-43 on the road. Lone Pine has made a habit of sweeping their opponents off the court, having now won ten contests by 21 points or more this season.
Lone Pine's win was a true team effort, with many players turning in solid performances. Perhaps the best among them was Cristian Duran, who scored 20 points along with two steals. Duran has been hot recently, having posted two or more steals the last four times he's played. Alfonso Castro was another key contributor, dropping a double-double on ten assists and ten steals.
Big Pine's win ended a ten-game drought on the road dating back to last season and puts them at 4-8. As for Lone Pine, they pushed their record up to 13-3 with that win, which was their seventh straight on the road.
Big Pine took a serious blow against the Golden Eagles in their previous meeting two weeks ago, falling 68-20. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Castro, who scored eight points along with eight assists and five steals. Now that Big Pine knows the damage he can cause, will they be able to stop him this time? There's only one way to find out.
