The Burbank High boys’ basketball opened Pacific League play Tuesday that one could say was similar to the weather we have seen locally over the past few weeks.
At times the Bulldogs were very cold shooting the basketball and at times they did well.
But the end result was not good enough to top visiting Muir High, which came away with a 62-53 victory.
Burbank early on struggled with Muir’s full-court press.
“We have some young guys that haven’t been through it and they were flustered. They’ll get better from it,” Burbank coach Sid Cooke said. “We can play with this team. We just need to hunker down and keep working.”
Burbank (1-6) actually held a 6-3 lead after one quarter as both teams played solid defense and limited each other to few good looks at the basket.
Muir then started to heat up from long distance, hitting four three-pointers in the second quarter alone.
Burbank had just two field goals in the first half that were not from three-point range and both of those came late in the half.
Muir (2-4) led by as much as 20 points early in the third quarter following a free throw from Khamron Cantrell, who had 11 points.
But Burbank started to get more comfortable with the press and as a result was able to improve its shot selection.
Daniel Contreras finished with 13 points for the Bulldogs, which included a trio of three-point shots.
But every time it looked like Burbank would be making a comeback, Muir’s Assad Muhammad would deliver an answer.
Muhammad had 15 points, all of which came from three-point shots and three of which came in the fourth quarter.
Muir also got 16 points from Joseph Dollaway and 13 points from Aziz Muhammad.
Elmer Reyes, Leo Tahmassian and Kelton Shea each had seven points for Burbank. Ben Burnham had six points.
Kevin Sarkes and Abiel Pearl each had five points. Vartan Avetisyan had three points.
