Local Product Bradberry Comes Up Big As Cacti Make History

Los Angeles, CA - 29 Palms Alumni, Jaylan Bradberry, chose a great time to have his best game of the season. The former Wildcat made an instant impact as soon as he came off the bench and he helped guide the Cacti to their first playoff win in school history; an 80-77 victory at LA Southwest College. Bradberry saw his first shot go down, a fourteen-foot baseline turnaround over the outstretched hand of the defender. That bucket gave the freshman confidence as he finished with 16 points on the night for Copper Mountain. He also excelled on the defensive end and rebounded the ball well on the night.

LA Southwest's game plan was to send double teams to Tyler Hudson and Mikah Blackwell every time they touched the ball. Makes sense considering those two have led the Cacti all year. The game plan proved to be effective for most of the game, but great players will find ways to help their team and those two did just that. Tyler Hudson still led the way with a 17 point effort as he got to the free-throw line often. Blackwell chipped in 12 for the Cacti. Both Hudson and Blackwell found themselves with four fouls halfway through the second half, but both did an excellent job avoiding the fifth.

The Cacti led for a majority of the first half and built as much as a seven-point lead early. They found themselves leading by one as both teams went to the locker room for halftime. LA Southwest came out strong to start the second half and would eventually build their biggest lead of the game, 52-43, with just over ten minutes to play in the game. Coach Walter Parham called timeout to regroup and it was the right move. CMC scored on their next two possessions to cut the lead to five. From there the Fighting Cacti kept trying to chip away and they would eventually take back the lead with a minute and a half left in the game. After a LA Southwest basket to go back up 2, Nathan Kennedy came down and hit the biggest shot of his young career, a three-pointer with 41 seconds left to put the Cacti up one. They would not relinquish the lead from there as they went on to win 80-77 on the road. Kennedy came off the bench to give the Cacti a big 15 points. 

Copper Mountain College will travel to Riverside Community College on Thursday, March 3 for a 5:00 PM game against the Tigers. Copper Mountain is the 22 seed in the Socal bracket of the CCCAA state playoffs. Riverside received the 6 seed.