Burbank basketball gets rolling, blasts past Chatsworth
ENCINO — It took a quarter for the Burbank High boys’ basketball team to find its touch Thursday against Chatsworth.
But once the Bulldogs got into a rhythm, they were able to leave the Chancellors in their wake in a pool-play game of the San Fernando Valley Invitational at Crespi High.
Leading by just three points after the first quarter, Burbank began knocking down its shots, converting three-pointers and playing tight defense that all translated to a 74-46 victory.
“We did start out a little slow in the game,” Burbank first-year Coach Jamayne Potts said. “We had a tournament with one of our lower teams last week and we didn’t have our usual practice times. We also had finals this week and the guys had to take care of that. That might have been why we were a little off in that first quarter.
“I just had to remind the guys of all the hard work we did over summer and the fall and get back to how we know we can play. …We just needed to slow things up a bit and relax.”
The Bulldogs (5-1), who finished third in the Burbank Tournament nearly two weeks ago, knocked down 10 three-pointers in dispatching Chatsworth (3-8). Four of those three-balls came from senior Ellie Hanno, who finished with 17 points in just the first three quarters. Junior Faraz Khandaker added 13 points, freshman Thomas Clark and junior Ben Chavez pitched in with 10 each and senior Levon Galstyan had six rebounds.
The teams combined to miss seven shots to start the game. The teams traded the lead in the first quarter and the score was knotted at 14 with under a minute remaining. But Burbank was able to go into the first break with a three-point cushion, 17-14, after Clark hit a three-pointer with 19 seconds left.
“We really weren’t executing early on,” Hanno said. “Once we started executing better, we started playing better and we were knocking our shots down. Our specialty is the three-pointer and we have a lot of guys who can knock that down.”
Burbank made some runs in the second quarter, pushing the lead to seven twice and eight three times. It wasn’t until Hanno converted a layup with 29 seconds left that the Bulldogs were able to go up by double digits, as they went into halftime with a 41-31 advantage.
Hanno and Khandaker each had 11 points in the second quarter and combined for 22 of the team’s 24 total points in the stanza.
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Jeff Tully, jeff.tully@latimes.com
Twitter: @jefftsports