The Hoover boys’ basketball team lost its opening Pacific League game on Friday evening, losing, 50-33, at home against Muir.

James Akerman (14 points) and Justin Herrera (12 points) led Hoover, which was playing without starter Zack Van Patten, who missed the game with an ankle injury.

Akerman had two three-pointers in the first quarter, which ended with a 12-10 lead for Hoover. 

The second quarter then started and ended up differently than the last quarter. With another three pointer made by Akerman, this still wasn’t enough to dominate the second quarter. Muir was in control of the second quarter and had an 18-17 lead at halftime.

“The main thing that was going through our heads was trying to get the team and the momentum back up because they had a good run, but I just wanted our team to get back that rhythm that we had going into halftime,” Herrera said.

The third quarter was, again, dominated and won by Muir, which increased its lead to seven at the end of the quarter. 

 “We can take away something from this game and move on to the next,” Akerman said. 

Herrera added: “We could’ve played a little better defense on transition. If we executed our offense a little better, we could’ve won this game.”

Hoover Coach Jack Van Patten didn’t make any excuses for his team losing.

“I don’t think we would do anything differently; we just need to execute our game plan a little better,” he said. “We don’t want to make any excuses just because we have guys injured.

“That’s an opportunity for the other guys to show that they could do the job, too. Things don’t come as easy when we’re missing guys, but we still plan on winning. If we had done what we were supposed to do, we would’ve won.”