The St. Anthony basketball program hosted its annual Fear the Halo Classic showcase on Saturday, bringing 13 teams into Saints’ Errion Gym for a full slate of seven games. The Saints matched up with Hesperia in the third game of the day, and couldn’t hang on with the Scorpions in a 59-47 loss.
“It’s a blessing to be able to host an event like this and have different schools and fans in the gym,” said St. Anthony coach Alan Mitchell. “Some people have never been to our school or even heard of us, so it’s a huge blessing.”
St. Anthony has alternated between wins and losses through its first five games this season while playing shorthanded and learning to mesh with a young roster. The Saints are still waiting for a few transfers to become eligible after the sit-out period, leaving a handful of underclassmen to step up early in the year.
The Saints came out sluggish and quickly fell into a sizable deficit, but they put together multiple positive runs in the second half. St. Anthony was led by freshman Mychal McQueen, who scored eight of his team-high 13 points in the fourth quarter. Junior Marinio Elissaint added 10 points, and Trystan Butardo finished with eight.
“Coach Sampson from Houston had a great message this week about wins and losses being wisdom and lessons, and that’s what we take from this,” Mitchell said. “We just have to be more prepared and more mature, but that comes with reps and experience.”
Hesperia leaned on its guard-center duo, getting a game-high 15 points from 6-foot-7 senior Nolan Newman-Gomez along with 15 from sophomore guard JJ Herd. The pair fueled a 14–0 Hesperia run to close the first quarter, and the Scorpions eventually led by as many as 22 points.
On the other side, the Saints struggled to generate offense early on, settling for highly contested looks and failing to capitalize on opportunities in the paint.
“The execution just went out the window and then we do things that are out of our culture,” Mitchell said. “Taking contested shots, we call those one-star shots, all it does is lead to more contested shots and that’s just as bad as a turnover. When you give a good team like Hesperia or any team out there that kind of confidence or rhythm, you’re putting yourself in a bad spot.”
St. Anthony switched to a full-court press coming out of the half, giving the Saints a spark on both ends of the floor. They opened the third quarter on an 8–0 run and held Hesperia scoreless for the first three minutes of the half. The Saints also put together a promising 15–3 surge in the fourth quarter.
“We just have to commit to 32 minutes of basketball, and we preach playing for four quarters,” Mitchell said. “We have to trust each other. I need to earn their trust and vice versa, but we just need to keep fighting.”
The Saints will look ahead to Redondo Union’s PacShores tournament on Thursday, and they’ll host the second session of their Fear the Halo Classic showcase on Dec. 20.
