This season has been a roller-coaster ride for the Diamond Bar varsity boys basketball team. After finishing the season with an overall record of 13-14, the Brahmas’ season has been cut short as the team did not make the CIF playoffs.

“It’s been kind of inconsistent. More so than anything, we’re always looking at our defensive effort and what we call the system. Are we in the proper spots, not necessarily [if we’re] making all our shots,” head coach Henry Frierson said.
Frierson believes that the team began to lose consistency toward the end of the season. The team is in a difficult league this year, competing against tougher teams.

“Our main goal was winning league, but we feel short on that goal as a team… I think us players had regrets of not working as hard as we could’ve during the off season and the season,” senior Austin Kim said.

However, the team still saw much development and progress within individual players. One player in particular, senior Tyler Peterson, stood out to coach Frierson as he improved the team throughout the season.

“The players, for the most part, responded to play well. Tyler Peterson was definitely a player we knew would be valuable to us, but I had no idea that he would become the basketball player that he was this season,” Frierson said.

In addition to Peterson, senior Brandon Rice scored the most points for the team, averaging 16.6 points per game with a shooting average of 46 percent.

The coach does not have a solid idea of what to expect of next season yet. Since, nine seniors from the team who are graduating, the program will be losing a lot of experience and mostly consist of underclassmen next year. Frierson will be using practices during the spring to take a look at the next season’s team, including any freshmen players.

“The season was a bit of a disappointment because with all the new transfers that were supposedly good, our expectations were higher. Next season I believe I can improve on scoring, the details that people don’t really notice, and getting physically stronger,” junior Peter Valencia said.

Though the coach believes not many improvements could be made for the next season, the team definitely plans to develop off-season on defense and shooting efforts.

“We left a lot on the tables. We could have done a better job. The guys always gives an amazing effort which is 90 percent of what a coach wants, but I thought there were a few moments that we could have improved our system and execution for sure,” Frierson said.