MONTEREY. La. &045; Monterey got its revenge.

With a 54-42 win over the Green Wave, the Wolves got even for a 56-52 loss to Cathedral Nov. 9.

&uot;We finally played together and played a full ballgame,&uot; Monterey head coach Robert Taylor said. &uot;We’ve been playing two, three good quarters and then falling apart. It feels good to win one. The kids worked hard and they didn’t choke.&uot;

Monterey jumped out to start the game, grabbing a 6-0 lead. Cathedral fought back to with seven consecutive points to take the lead, and the team’s went back and forth for much of the first half. Cathedral’s Matt Goss hit two three-pointers in the first quarter that helped Cathedral stay in the game.

The Wolves appeared to have taken a solid lead at 26-20 late in the second quarter, but again Cathedral closed the gap to 26-24 at halftime behind free throws from Alex Middleton and Jeremy Davis and a basket from Andrew Ellard.

In the second half the Wolves came out on fire, led by stellar guard play from Layton Strebeck, who had 13 points in the game, Monterey outscored Cathedral 13-7 in the third quarter, taking a 41-31 lead that would be all it needed.

The Wolves held on to the ball for long stretches of the final quarter, preventing Cathedral from scoring and taking tie off the clock. Monterey hit nine of 13 free throw attempts in the fourth quarter to seal the victory.

&uot;I was real pleased at the end,&uot; Taylor said. &uot;They held up to the pressure and didn’t choke.&uot;

As he has been all season, Matt Shively was the star for the Wolves. He led all scorers with 19 points in the game. Shively exposed the Cathedral front line, grabbing numerous rebounds and getting some easy putbacks throughout the contest.

Cathedral head coach Peter Arnold blamed his team’s loss on a lack of intensity.

&uot;I think we were a little overconfident having beaten them before,&uot; Arnold said.

Monterey also cut down on its turnovers in the second half. In the first half, Cathedral scored a number of baskets off of 14 Wolves’ turnovers, but the Monterey guards took better care of the ball after halftime, using passing to break the Cathedral press.

Even when Cathedral’s zone defense stymied the Wolves for long stretches, the Green Wave had trouble capitalizing on it because of very poor shooting.

&uot;We shot terribly,&uot; Arnold said. &uot;I’ll have to look to see what the stats were, but whatever it was, it was bad.&uot;

It was a very different game from the teams’ first meeting Nov. 9, when Cathedral busted out after halftime to storm back and take the game in the fourth quarter.

This time around, Monterey was the team that played better in the second half, taking care of the ball and extending its lead until it was too late for the Green Wave to make a serious run at the victory.