File photo – Olivia Railsback

The College of the Redwoods men’s basketball team split a pair of games at Gavilan on Friday and Saturday.

They opened the Andrel Gaines Classic with a 74-59 win over the host school for their first true road win of the season, before falling to Cabrillo, the No. 3 team in the state, by a score of 102-94.

The CR women also were in action this week at the San Jose tournament, opening with a 74-55 win over Saddleback on Thursday and following that with a 74-46 loss to San Jose City College on Friday.

Trey Neff led the CR men with 20 points in Friday’s win, while Ty Neff and Mason Railsback each finished with 14 points.

“We played probably our best defense of the year in that first half,” said head coach Ryan Bisio, whose team led 38-24 at halftime. “Our guys felt really connected and were able to sustain a high vibration together. We played so hard it was mesmerizing.”

The CR men had 12 3-pointers in the win, including 10 in the first half.

They played without the injured Garrett Hall and Oliver Tatton and also saw Railsback and Mason Mottashed both foul out.

“Trey got us off to a good start offensively and everybody chimed in after that,” Bisio added. “Our rotation is stretched pretty thin right now and we got tired which affected our shooting in the second half. But we kept digging in defensively all night.”

The CR men are now 10-8.

Next up, they open conference play at home against Butte on Jan. 13.

The CR women, meanwhile, were unable to carry the momentum from a third straight win on Thursday into Friday’s showdown against San Jose.

“We didn’t quite have the same energy as (Thursday),” head coach Jian Tuey said after Friday’s loss. “We had a couple of players struggle with fouls early and we weren’t able to play as aggressively on defense.”

File photo – Ellie Pesch

Ellie Pesch continued her impressive season with 14 points in the loss and gave the Corsairs a spark from downtown with four 3-pointers.

Olivia Railsback also had a good game offensively and finished with eight points, while Ronee Norwood, Kyla Albee and Alia Prentiss each chipped in six points.

The Corsairs were 5-10 heading into their tourney finale against Mission College on Saturday afternoon.

Next up, the CR women return home to host Cabrillo on Jan. 8 before opening conference play at home against Butte on Jan. 13.