WATSONVILLE—Watsonville High junior Karlos Corpus and the boys’ basketball team set the goal of going undefeated in league play and bringing home a championship banner.
The Wildcatz have a strong chance of winning the Pacific Coast Athletic League Santa Lucia Division title as they sit with a perfect 8-0 record in the league standings.
It’s the going undefeated part that’s always the trickiest, especially now that they have a target on their backs.
Corpus said they’re not a secret anymore, but a lot of other teams didn’t expect Watsonville to be a threat in the division. He believes that won’t be the case in the second half of league play because opponents will have something to prove.
“But we have something to prove, also,” Corpus said. “I feel like they’re going to come out and give us our best game because right now we haven’t been beaten and they want to be [the team that beats us].”
Senior guard Richie Ortiz, who has been a scoring machine for the ’Catz, said opponents will definitely know what to expect from them this time around.
“They’re going to know us way better as players and same thing for them, we’re going to know them, too,” he said. “We just gotta keep doing things that we did and just do them better.”
Watsonville hasn’t won a league title since the 2010-11 season when it competed in the now-defunct Monterey Bay League.
Corpus believes the ’Catz can capture a league title with an undefeated record because this group isn’t selfish with the ball and they rely on each other to get the job done.
“We’re all brothers here and I feel like we can get it done,” he said. “We have a goal, we said it from the beginning that that’s what we want. We want to put a banner up there, it hasn’t been done for I think 11 years and it’s a goal we want. It’s a goal our coaches want, too.”
One example of solidarity is that the team—from players to the coaches— wears the same low-top neon green, pink and yellow Nike shoes.
“It’s a statement we made that we’re all together,” Corpus said. “They’re not our colors, black and yellow, they’re different. But I think it sets the team off, like ‘Why are they wearing different color shoes? Why do they look funky?’ I think it gets in their head but also it makes us feel together as one.”
Watsonville coach Marcus Northcutt said the amount of progress the team has made in one season is incredible. Normally, it takes a full season for a team to grow as this year’s group has, Northcutt said.
“The confidence in the system seems higher than ever before,” Northcutt said. “They know what we’re trying to accomplish and that has made the difference.”
Watsonville began the season with four straight losses including two at the Alisal High Jose Solis Vantory Miles Invitational. They bounced back with a 55-51 win against Greenfield High and never looked back.
Since then, they’ve won 14 of their last 16 games and currently own a 14-7 overall record.
The Wildcatz have also played in some wild contests, including a come-from-behind 79-72 overtime win against Rancho San Juan High. Corpus said they underestimated them and didn’t consider the Trailblazers as a big threat.
“They shocked us and that’s what kind of caught us off guard,” he said. “In that fourth quarter, we found that we needed that work that we all put in and we’re not going to give it up. We pulled it off and it was a crazy game.”
Ortiz dropped 29 points, including nine in the overtime period to help the Wildcatz get past the Trailblazers in league play on Jan. 29.
“We just pulled through and it was one of those moments where it either breaks you down or you keep going,” Ortiz said. “We just kept going and in the fourth quarter we finally turned it on.”
Ortiz said they knew they had to pick it up and they didn’t want the streak to end. They rallied back in the fourth quarter and outscored RSJ, 13-6, in overtime.
Oswaldo Hernandez added 16 points for the Wildcatz.
“We were playing way harder, way tougher and way more physical,” said Ortiz about how they were able to rally back. “We got in their heads a little bit, they were definitely scared.”
Ortiz finished with a career-high 30 points in a 60-38 win against Gonzales High.
Northcutt said their constant effort and competitiveness have made practice feel like a game.
“We used to go into games hoping and now we’re going into games expecting. That changes your mentality,” he said. “It doesn’t mean you’re going to win, but you know you have the opportunity to really win, and win tough games.”
The Wildcatz are heading into the second half of the PCAL Santa Lucia division schedule. They recently beat King City High, 64-60, to keep their league record unblemished.
Jacob Marinez scored a season-best 26 points including a pair of 3-pointers for Watsonville, and Matthew Gonzalez came off the bench to add 10 points.
“Every game we find out new things we have to work on, keep working on them, get better at the things we’re good at and be great,” Ortiz said.
Watsonville kept the streak alive after a 50-46 win against RSJ on Thursday. Corpus said the next set of games will be difficult to play, especially because three of the last four are on the road starting at Marina High on Monday at 7pm.
But, he added that they’ll have the coaching staff and the upperclassmen to look up to whenever the time comes for assistance.
“I feel like we just need to motivate each other and keep our roll going and have that goal in our mind,” Corpus said.
