This week, ASB hosted a March Madness basketball tournament in the gym on Monday through Friday.
Players were divided into 8 teams of 5, and would face off in standard bracket tournament style. Students could sign up using the website SignUpGenius.
Starting the week off, there were two matches of the quarter finals held. The first match was between Nico Collins’ RWE and John Battles’ SJ Goons.
RWE won the game 10-4 while having most of the possession of the ball between them and SJ Goons. One of the main highlights of the match was Yonathan Ebuy’s three-point shot securing RWE’s win.
Monday’s second match was between Javier Rocha’s 2016 Chino Hills and Kevin Tang’s LaVar’s Ball. 2016 Chino Hills had a surprising victory against LaVar’s Ball, beating them 13-2 with a great performance from Tyler Felix.
Tuesday also came with two matches; the third match of the quarterfinals was between Hayden Tieu’s Diddy Bops and Nicholas Reinhart’s Goon Squad United.
This match ended in a score of 15-9, with Diddy Bops taking the win, advancing them to the semifinals.
The fourth and final quarterfinal match of the week was between Noah Sonntags Dubai and Lukas Nguyen’s Goonicide. Their match finished with a score of 12-6, with Dubai being the final team to enter the semi finals
Wednesday was the start of the semi finals, starting off was Diddy Bops vs. Dubai. With a final score of 15-9, Diddy Bops had qualified for March Madness finals.
The last spot for a chance at winning the finals was between 2016 Chino Hills and RWE. The match concluded with a low score of only 5-2, this being one of the most physical and equally skilled games.
“Never underestimate the underdogs,” said Jonathan Tanori.
The final match of the tournament was held on Thursday with the Diddy Bops and 2016 Chino Hills facing off.
This match had two times the normal length than all of the other games, having two halves as well.
The score was pretty close at half time, with 2016 Chino Hills only having one more point than Diddy Bops.
Heading into the final minutes of the game with both teams having an equal chance of winning.
Jayvohn Johnson scored three three-point shots in a row leading his team to victory. The final score being 25-17.
“Take risks to win big”, said Johnson.
Javi Rocha acknowledged Jesus Alvarez as man of the match for the losing team, 2016 Chino Hills.
“It was a blast to play with Chino Hills and I’ll gladly do it again next year,” said Alvarez.
As an extra bonus game for students to watch, there was a students vs. staff game on Friday. With Diddy Bops representing the students.
Surprisingly, the students only won by one point, with the score being eighteen to seventeen.
Even though students had won, there was controversy at half time if the teachers should have been deducted one point or not. Ultimately they were, after referees deduced that a three point shot was actually a two pointer.
“I don’t really think it was a win because they changed the score at half time, but they worked really hard and knew each other’s strengths,” D’Airrien Jackson, a member of the teacher team said.
