SANTA CRUZ >> The Santa Cruz Warriors’ annual game on Golden State’s home court always draws a good crowd. But the Mexico City Capitanes, Santa Cruz’s opponent at the Chase Center in San Francisco on March 9, added some spice to the matchup Friday night.

The Warriors committed too many turnovers early and struggled to find their rhythm from behind the arc, but they didn’t go down without a fight in their 121-113 loss to the Capitanes in their NBA G League battle at Kaiser Permanente Arena.

Literally. Two skirmishes took place in the third quarter and players had to be separated by officials and coaches. Mexico City’s Greg Brown III and Kyle Rose, and Santa Cruz’s Quinten Post were ejected after the first scrap with 10:25 on the game clock. Roughly three minutes later, the Warriors’ Seth Maxwell and Capitanes’ Juan Toscano-Anderson were given offsetting technical fouls for their heated exchange.

A total of seven technical fouls were called. Brown was on the receiving end of two of them.

“It wasn’t very fun,” said Nicholas Kerr, the Warriors’ second-year head coach. “I was just really frustrated for most of the game. It was fun at the end, I guess. It would’ve been nice to have won, but, at least, we felt like we played to our standard the last 18 to 20 minutes of the game.”

Santa Cruz’s Kevin Knox II scored a game-high 30 points to go along with eight rebounds. Jackson Rowe had 19 points and eight rebounds, and Javan Jackson had 17 points and six rebounds. Marcus Burk came off the bench and scored 12 points in 15 minutes.

The Warriors (6-2) committed 10 of their 17 turnovers in the first quarter, but settled down in the second half. Guard Cameron Parker relieved Yuri Collins, who had four turnovers and a minus-21 rating when on the court — second to only Rowe (minus-25) — impressed Kerr.

“Cam was phenomenal,” Kerr said. “He came in at a low point in the game and really helped turn it around with his passing. To be honest, he helped show Yuri the right way to go attack that. … And Yuri was great down the stretch in the fourth quarter.”

Parker, who set an NCAA single-game record with 24 assists in University of Montana’s win over Pine Manor on Dec. 1, 2019, finished with his G League-best 10 assists. Collins returned to the court and finished with 15 assists.

“I felt good,” Parker said. “I missed a lot of layups, so that’s what I was kinda hanging my head on. I was just trying to get my teammates open. Just try to drive to the paint, and then we have so many able to shoot threes at high level or cut. They really make it easier for me. It’s more my teammates making it easier for me than the passes I’m making for them. They gotta make ’em for me to get the assist.”

The Warriors shot 45.7% (42 of 92) from the field, and 28.3% (13 of 46) from beyond the arc. Two of their 3-point attempts were airballs and a couple others were also well off the mark.

Fifteen of the Warriors’ turnovers took place in the first half.

“Part sloppiness with the decisions we made, part just not being in the correct spacing, not cutting when we’re supposed to cut,” Kerr said. “That’s a really aggressive defense, so you need to respond, you need to be cutting, We tried to attack it with cutting, and not being in spacing, it took us so long to get to that. And once we did, we were able to score. It just took too long to get to that.”

Santa Cruz trailed by as many as 20 points early in the second half, but Knox fueled a rally to help the Warriors pull within three points, 98-95, on Donta Scott’s tip-in with 6:26 remaining. Mexico City (5-2) received 3s from three players during an 11-5 run in the fourth quarter and made six free throws in the final minute to secure the win.

Toscano-Anderson, a former Santa Cruz Warrior and a member of Golden State’s 2022 NBA championship team, returned to his old stomping grounds and was an animated, vocal and fiery presence for the duration of the contest.

He recorded a double-double with 11 points, 11 rebounds, and four assists. Guard Trey Burke scored a team-high 26 points for Mexico City. Brown scored 16 points before making his early exit, and Dink Pate, and reserves Felipe Haase and Ivan Gandia-Rosa each score 13.

In all, Mexico City had eight players reach double digits in scoring. Davon Reed had 12 points and eight rebounds, and reserve David Jones Garcia scored 11 points.

Gary Payton II, a G League champion in ’19 with Rio Grande Valley and NBA champion in ’22 with Golden State, sat courtside and was among the sellout crowd of 2,476 fans.

After the game, he and Toscano-Anderson embraced and posed for photographs.

The Warriors wore special, Mexican inspired “Los Warriors” jerseys, which were auctioned off to fans after the contest. A Latin theme was present throughout the evening. A mariachi band entertained fans as they entered the venue, and both the U.S. and Mexican national anthems were played before the game. The well received Ensambles Ballet Folklorico de San Francisco performed at halftime.

Public address announcer Brian Day joined in on the fun, counting off “Uno, Dos, Tres” for every Santa Cruz 3-pointers.

Latin music bared during most timeouts, including Los Del Río’s “Macarena” and Ritchie Valens’ “La Bamba.”