REDONDO BEACH, Ca. – Each of the 62nd Pacific Shores Tournament championship quarterfinals played Tuesday at Redondo Union High was reasonably competitive – even if none of them proved to be down-to-the-wire affairs.
Top three seeds St. John Bosco (over Long Beach Millikan), Los Angeles Westchester (over Long Beach Poly) and host Redondo (over North Hollywood Campbell Hall) prevailed by 14, 12 and eight points, respectively Tuesday.
Only fifth seed Lakewood Mayfair (over fourth seed Compton, 75-66) provided an element of “surprise” to Tuesday’s proceedings.
The Tuesday action set the stage for what could prove to be a couple of dynamic semifinals – even if they are separated by about four and one-half hours.
St. John Bosco’s unbeaten and top-ranked CIF Southern Section Pac-5 football team has a championship semifinal set for 7 o’clock Friday night at Alemany High in Mission Hills, so the Braves got the OK from tournament administrators to play their game against Mayfair with a 3:30 p.m. tipoff on Friday.
The other championship semifinal – between Redondo and Westchester – will get underway at the much more traditional time of 8 p.m.
The rest of Friday’s schedule (with the tournament taking Wednesday and – naturally – Thanksgiving off:
(12th-place semifinals) Small gym, Noon, Peninsula vs. Morningside; 1:30 p.m., Palos Verdes vs. Rolling Hills Prep; (fifth-place semifinals) Main gym, 12:30, Millikan vs. Compton; 2, Poly vs. Campbell Hall; (championship semifinal) 3:30, St. John Bosco vs. Mayfair; (consolation semifinals) 5, Pacific Hills vs. Lawndale; 6:30, Calabasas vs. Narbonne; (championship semifinal) 8, Westchester vs. Redondo Union.
In Tuesday’s action:
*Mayfair 75, Compton 66: The Monsoons’ Kendall Small, with 27 points and what seemed like a boatload of assists and steals, made a strong statement about who may be the best junior point guard in Southern California while leading his new team – he’s a transfer from Ocean View in Huntington Beach – to a mild upset of the Tarbabes.
Coach Tony Davis’ squad got excellent performances from all of his perimeter performers for the second day in a row as seniors Dillon Reise, Mike Nwabuzor and Isaac Deese turned in strong efforts, via jump shots and drives.
*St. John Bosco 83, Millikan 69: A second consecutive day of performances both flashy and substantive by way of seniors Malik Marquetti (25 points) and Mark Thomas (22) helped the Millikan Rams – playing arguably the most physically gifted team in Southern California – within striking distances for all but the final couple of minutes.
But no one in the 16-team field has been as impressive as was 6-7 Braves’ senior Daniel Hamilton (27 points and 18 rebounds) on Tuesday, when his dynamic skill helped keep SJB from being on the bad side of quite the early-season upset.
Junior guard Tyler Dorsey added 23 points, along with 10 rebounds, for St. John Bosco.
*Westchester 72, Poly 60: The final margin of the Comets’ victory was a tad deceiving, as the contest was tight throughout.
Three “frustration technical fouls” called against the Jackrabbits resulted in a six-point swing in Coach Ed Azzam’s crew’s favor.
Loyola Marymount University-bound forward Elijah Stewart led the Comets with 23 points and 12 rebounds, and he seemingly made just about every key play – at both ends of the floor – down the stretch.
Chris Sullivan led Poly with 28 points, 12 of those coming by way of shots from behind the arc.
*Redondo 68, Campbell Hall 60: Even with junior point guard Kahlil Simplis in street clothes (with an ankle sprain suffered the night before in the win over Lawndale) and classmate Aaron Holiday suffering through an erratic performance (with at least 10 turnovers, by unofficial count), Campbell Hall hung tough throughout.
The most significant reason for that was the jump shooting of Jordan Cohen and Gabe Salazar (four 3s), as well as the ability of Holiday to make some spectacular plays (when he was turning apiece the ball over, due in large part of the defense of sophomore Leland Green with plenty of help from his teammates).
Senior center Terrell Carter powered his way to a team-high 17 points for the Sea Hawks while Green chipped in with 14.
Holiday (19), Cohen (17) and Salazar (13) combined for all but 11 of their team’s points.
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