Sanatura Escazu 68 Barva 83

The signs were there. I just ignored them. Five minutes before game time, I was informed by the referee Edgar Ibarra  that three of my players were wearing impermissible socks. I glanced over and see ankle length socks instead of calf length socks. Of course, there were other players that had socks that were very similar that were apparently okay (including all but one Barva player), but we had to scramble to find socks for three of our players minutes before tipoff. This was the first time all season that this was brought to my attention, and this happens five minutes before game time (and not twenty minutes before when the refs took the court?). And I'm looking through the FIBA playing rules for 2012 and I don't see anything about socks.

This is exhibit #3,789 what is wrong with basketball in Costa Rica. Honestly, they're giving me a hard time about athletic socks and they still can't get the basic calls right (hello, principle of verticality anyone?). This is the same ref who in last year's decisive semifinal against Barva called our team for 14 more fouls than the opposing team...and called more fouls than the other two refs combined. His reputation around the league is that he is a Barva shill; I tend to give refs the benefit of doubt, but after last night it really makes me wonder.

So ten minutes into the game, it really wasn't a surprise that our entire starting five was saddled with two fouls apiece (and in Dave milliner's case three fouls). And despite the massive foul trouble, we were hanging in there, down a manageable seven points at the end of the first quarter. Early in the second quarter, Diego Loria gets called for a non existent foul, draws an immediate technical and then gets ejected for applauding (okay, I get the second T...that was kind of dumb, but the foul and first technical was total bush league).  So Henry Martinez calmly goes to the free throw line for six free throws, taking a five point lead up to eleven and then an ensuing basket against our shellshocked squad.

Coming out of halftime down by 12, after talking about keeping cool heads, our point guard Alonso Sanchez gets T'ed up for  complaining about a non-call where he got raked across the arms, drawing his third foul one possession into the third quarter. And while we had some mini runs, we never posed a serious threat the rest of the way. Even when we would whittle it back to nine points, Barva would respond with big baskets and runs of their own, pushing the lead up to17 points.

The reffing was not the decisive factor; we didn't do very good job in other facets of the game. The truth of the matter is Barva played better than us and that's why they deserved to win. They were mentally tougher and did a better job of executing their offense (and even they have room for improvement). It was a measuring stick game for us and we came up short; the title favorite is who we thought it would be.

Game Notes

"The reffing was awesome"

• Reinner Little led our scoring with 14 points with Dave Millinier and Javier Bustamante scoring 13 apiece. Henry Martinez led the Barva scoring with twenty points, including about a million tries from the free throw line.
• Our free throw shooting was horrible. I haven't seen the score sheet but I'm guessing we were below 60%. It's mildly surprising because we have good free throw shooters on this team who have gotten off to cold starts.
• We're without our sub 21 players the next two weeks. They have been sequestered for Juegos Nacionales, where Escazu is one of the favorites.