Flintridge Prep boys’ basketball takes down San Marino at free-throw line

SAN MARINO — In a contest in which scoring was at a premium, clutch free-throw shooting down the stretch separated the Flintridge Prep and San Marino High boys’ basketball teams.

The visiting Rebels hit 10 of 12 shots from the charity stripe in the fourth quarter to turn a low-scoring affair into a 39-34 nonleague road victory Tuesday evening.

With the win, Flintridge Prep survived the bumpy nonleague portion of the season by reaching .500 at 5-5 with its Prep League opener at Chadwick on Friday up next.

“We expected the pace of this game to be pretty slow and the tempo not to be fast and that’s what happened,” Flintridge Prep Coach Garrett Ohara said. “We looked up at halftime and saw that we weren’t scoring at all, but we had only allowed 15 points. We knew that the offense would eventually pick up.”

Despite scoring a season-low 39 points on 12-of-41 shooting (29%), the Rebels held San Marino to 34 points (second-fewest points allowed this season) on 11-of-51 shooting (22%).

Flintridge Prep’s struggles offensively, though, were at least offset by its free-throwing shooting, as the Rebels pulled away thanks to their ability to make shots and San Marino’s inability to match them.

Junior forward Dante Fregoso led all players with 14 points, but was particularly stout for the Rebels down the stretch.

Fregoso hit four consecutive free throws with the Rebels in the double-bonus to put Flintridge Prep ahead, 34-28, with 2:39 remaining in the game.

“As soon as I got to the line, I just calmed down,” said Fregoso, who added seven rebounds. “I knew we weren’t scoring, but we could at least hit free throws.”

San Marino (8-6) and Flintridge Prep then responded with field goals as a running layup from Titans senior guard Blake Kunitake at 2:17 was countered by a jumper from junior guard Andrew Tsangeos (eight points, 11 rebounds and three assists) at the 1:52 mark to give the Rebels a 36-30 advantage.

A foul by Fregoso with 1:30 remaining only resulted in one point for the Titans, while Flintridge Prep’s Miles Johnson was fouled the other way and sank two free throws to give the Rebels a 38-31 lead with 1:11 left.

While San Marino’s Jadyn Torres (seven points) drained a three with 57.2 seconds left to pull his squad within 38-34, the Titans never closed the gap, as the Rebels ended with a free throw from Kendall Kikkawa to seal the game.

“From the stands, it just looks like we missed a bunch of shots and that’s what lost us the game,” San Marino Coach Mihail Papadopulos said. “But it should never come down to a matter of shots. We didn’t play good enough offensively all night, whether that was passing, shot selection, execution. This was just a bad night all around.”

Even with San Marino’s cold shooting, the Titans scored the last five points of the first quarter in taking a 9-5 advantage.

San Marino later closed out the first half with a three-pointer from Brian Low off a running baseline pass from Torres right before the first-half buzzer that put the Titans up, 15-11, at the end of two quarters.

Flintridge Prep finally pulled ahead, 20-18, on a jumper from Jake Althouse (seven point and nine rebounds) with 2:19 left in the third and then maintained a 23-22 lead at the end of the quarter on a four-footer from Althouse off an assist from Tsangeos.

San Marino’s Alex Cate led his team in defeat with 10 points, seven rebounds and two steals.