BEAVERTON — At first glance, the Benson Astros look as if they could be one of the teams that makes some noise in the Portland Interscholastic League’s boys basketball race this season.
How much noise? That remains to be seen. But at least for one night, Benson had its way with the Mountainside Mavericks, rolling to a 75-64 non-conference victory in the season opener for both teams Friday at Mountainside High School.
Dache Acelar scored a game-high 28 points and Kendall Hopkins-McGlothen finished with 16 points as the Astros defeated Mountainside for the first time in series history, snapping six-game losing streak.
Richad Hudson added 10 points, six rebounds, and eight assists for Benson, and helped spearhead a high-pressure defense that forced 20 Mountainside turnovers — 16 in the first half when the Astros jumped out to a 38-22 lead.
Acelar, the 6-foot-1 senior guard, knocked down three free throws as Benson extended its biggest lead of the night to 46-24 with 5:58 to play in the third quarter and the Astros maintained at least a 10-point lead the rest of the way.
“It was crazy, man,” Acelar said. “I love playing against Mountainside. I’ve played with a couple of those guys for a long time, I knew they were a tough team, and we knew that we had to fight really hard to get that win.
“No doubt about that. You could see, there was blood on the floor, everybody droppin’, we had two people foul out, but we earned that win. We’re all happy about that win and we’re all excited for this season. This was a great way to open the season.”
Benson coach Earl Clark agreed.
“This is a wonderful place to play basketball at and to beat such a great program in our first game, can’t never take it for granted,” Clark said. “I think our pressure early really set the tone and then we were able to finish it out with the big plays down the stretch and by making free throws.
“I think the secret to our success is we have a lot of people who are able to play good basketball. We’re not one-dimensional at all and that’s hard to stop.”
The Astors were young a year ago when they went 14-11 overall and 10-6 in the PIL, and they’re still young. On Friday, they started one senior (Acelar), one junior (Hudson), two sophomores (JP Parnell-Patton and Malu Niko), and one freshman (Hopkins-McGlothen).
They’re not blessed with great height — Parnell-Patton and Niko are the tallest starters, each at 6-4, and the tallest player, 6-5 junior Daylen McKelvey, comes off the bench. But they are athletic and aggressive, especially when it comes to defense.
“I just love watching us get after it,” Clark said. “Pressure defense, that’s like the history of Benson basketball, and for us to be able to play that way for 32 minutes, that’s something that’s special to me.”
Mountainside coach Dustin Hewitt pointed to the 16 first-half turnovers and the 22-point deficit early in the third quarter as the two biggest differences in the game.
“I was really disappointed in the first half with our we handled Benson’s pressure,” Hewitt said. “And it was impressive — their pressure. Like, it got us rattled. I was curious to see how we’d respond. It just took us too long to handle it.
“I was proud of our effort starting mid-third quarter on. We started to handle it a little bit and I thought we played well. It’s just you can’t dig yourself a hole against a team like that.”
Mountainside twice cut Benson's lead to 10 points in the fourth quarter— the second time when Eli Vizconde converted a Astros’ turnover into a layup that made it 55-45 with 5:12 remaining.
Benson answered with a Hudson 3-pointer and then the Astros knocked down 11 of 12 free throws in the final four minutes to seal the win.
“We scored a lot of buckets out there, but our defense is what held us in this game,” said Acelar, who went 7 for 12 from the field with three 3-pointers and 11 for 12 at the free-throw line. “We’re not trying to get too excited about this game. We’re not going to get too high. We’re going to use it as momentum, though.”
Mountainside’s Rogen Brown scored a team-high 23 points, while Vizconde finished with 16 points and Palmer Ochoa added 11 points.
“Benson made a lot of shots. Credit to them,” Hewitt said. “We missed a lot of free throws (6 for 14). We make those, the game is a little tighter and … you never know. But they got the lead up to 22 and our guys didn’t flinch. They just kept going, kept doing what we were doing, and got them into a lot of foul trouble, so I was very proud of that.
“The lesson is going to be not to dig yourself a hole against a really good team.”
The Mavericks, coming off a season when they went 11-14 overall and 5-7 in the Metro League, are counting on big things from a starting five that features two seniors (Kobi Nicholson and Vizconde) and three juniors (Ryder Eck, Brown, and Ochoa).
“I think we’re really balanced, which makes us hard to guard, because we’ve got multiple guys that can put it in the basket,” Hewitt said. “You never really know what you’ve got until the first game.
“I think Jesuit and Southridge are probably favored (in the Metro). Both have a lot of talent coming back. After that, it could be a dogfight, but I think anyone can beat anyone on any given night. There’s a lot of depth in the Metro. I think it’s the most well-coached league in the state and the thing is our league is young. A lot of teams are starting a lot of juniors, so … this year is just a tune-up. Next year, it’s going to be legit.”
As for Benson and the PIL, that race also shapes as a potential season-long dogfight, according to Clark.
“We just want to compete every game,” he said. “We feel like we can beat anybody, but we also can lose to anybody. We’ve just got to make sure we come to play.
“We’re young, but we have some experience. Hopefully, that will all mesh together, and we’ll have a chance to be successful. There’s a lot of parity in the PIL. I think we’re going to be in the mix, but that depends on if you play with your ‘A game’ or not each night.”
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