Villa Park boys basketball team gets back on track with 84-46 victory over Murrieta Mesa in Charlie Wilkins Tournament

Julien Franklin scored 24 points Thursday night to lead Villa Park to a victory.

Villa Park’s boys basketball team, after getting upset Tuesday by St. Anthony’s of Long Beach 75-60 in the Charlie Wilkins Memorial Tournament at Westminster, got back on track Thursday night.

The Spartans led from the start and coasted to an 84-46 victory over Murrieta Mesa in the second round of the tournament.

Villa Park (12-1) looked poised for a match-up with Mater Dei in the finals, but Tuesday’s loss ended those hopes.

“It was a bounce back; we had a little blip the other night,” said Villa Park Coach Kevin Reynolds. “I don’t think we played very well, some of that was St. Anthony’s taking us out of our stuff so we were very focused on making sure we bounced back strong.

“This team (Murrieta Mesa) was 5-1 or 6-1, I felt like they were a good team as well, so we wanted to make sure we came back strong. We played in character. St. Anthony’s took us out of character and we didn’t play correctly. For us, we have a very specific way we have to play and I think we did that tonight.”

The Spartans had a balanced scoring attack, led by Julien Franklin, who scored 24 points. Maceo Reddick added 18 points, Gabe Barrios had 15 points and Cal Whitney 14 points.

“I thought Julien was great; he always is,” Reynolds said. “Riley Schroeder did a great job on the boards (11 rebounds) and defensively (six blocks) and Maceo gave us a good lift scoring. It was a pretty good team win; everybody played well.”

After Villa Park moved out to a 40-point lead at the end of the third quarter, the game was played with a running clock.