RIVERSIDE, Ca. – Doug Mitchell’s teams have won six CIF Southern Section and four state title, as well as 20 league championships during his 32 seasons as the boys’ basketball coach at Torrance’s Bishop Montgomery High.
The proof is in the on-court results – he, his staff and players crank out quality teams, year after year.
Oh, yeah – those teams improve over the course of a season.
What you see in late November or December isn’t likely what you’re going to see of the Knights in February and March.
And that’s the case this season, too, albeit with a pandemic-altered timeline.
Barely three weeks ago, after a May 5 Del Rey League loss (59-53) at St. Bernard, Mitchell’s underclassmen-laden Knights were zip and six – as in zero wins and six losses.
“We were figuring some things out,” Mitchell said Wednesday night in the Riverside Poly High gymnasium, minutes before his team’s Southern Section Division I playoff game with the host Bears.
Mitchell and his staff – and, of course, a croup of players among which only two seniors get significant minutes – did a job of “figuring out” those things since that early-May evening in Playa del Rey.
They subsequently won five of their next six Del Rey League games before boarding their charter bus Wednesday afternoon for Riverside on a four-game winning streak.
And, despite getting into the gym something short of “fashionably late” by any coach’s standards – the Knights and their coaches walked in 38 minutes short of the scheduled 7 p.m. tip-off, by way of a bus that arrived at Bishop Montgomery at 4:30, an hour later Mitchell had planned – the Knights played just well enough to continue their season into at least Friday night.
Sophomore Will Smith’s on-ball defense of the Bears’ Payden White – and classmate’s Xavier Edmonds’ block of a jump shot from the short left-corner by Riverside Poly’s Davion Johnson – helped secure the Knights’ 41-40 victory.
The Knights’ next bus trip will take them to Anaheim Friday evening, where they will take on host Fairmont Prep in a Round of 16 game.
The 6-foot-8 Edmonds (pictured) spent the final 7:33 of the second quarter on the bench after being called for his second personal.
But, despite getting whistled for his third early in the third quarter, he was on the floor when Mitchell and his team needed him most – at both ends of the floor.
In a game that, for the most part, half-court defense sucked the productivity out of the opponents’ offense, the biggest and strongest player (who also had the best low-post footwork) on the floor was the go-team guy for the Knights down the stretch.
Edmonds converted his sixth layup, while being fouled on the shot, to put his team up, 41-36 (the biggest lead either team held), with 2:22 to go.
But Edmonds (who scored 14 points with nine rebounds) missed his third free throw of the quarter and the quickest player in the building – junior guard Chance Stephens – was fouled by Jalen Vazquez on a burst on the dribble for the Bears and converted both ends of the 1-and-1 to get the Bears to within 41-38.
Edmonds, operating from the free-throw line, hitting a cutting Smith with a nifty pass but he couldn’t convert layup and, after his team secured the rebound, Bears’ Coach Yancy Dodson got a timeout.
White, a 6-4 forward who started at Corona Centennial last season as a sophomore, missed a jumper but 6-5 senior Travis McDowell followed in the rebound to get the Ivy League champions (10-2) to within a point with 1:16 remaining.
After resuming play following a Mitchell timeout, the Knights punched a pass into Edmonds on the right block but he was called – a legit officials’ call, FYI – for shuffling his feet (aka, “traveling”) before he could get the ball up on the glass and into the rim for another layup with 48 seconds to play.
McDowell missed a shot that would have put his team up and the ball went out of bounds and was still in the Bears’ possession when play resumed.
That’s when, with about 13 seconds to go, White – from out top – tried to dribble by Smith and get into the lane.
That option cut off by Smith, White flipped a pass to Johnson for what ever-so-briefly looked like a clean look at the rim and potential game-winning jump shot.
But Edmonds – not leaving his feet while closing out on the 5-11 Johnson – blocked the shot with about four seconds to go.
White recovered the ball along the left baseline, just outside of the lane, but his rushed attempt at a follow fell off the glass and into the hands of McDowell – whose rebound and layup were both well after the final buzzer.
Stephens (19), White (12) and McDowell (nine) scored all of the Bears’ points but only McDowell had a fourth-quarter bucket.
Vazquez added 13 points for the Knights, including three 3s, three assists and six rebounds.
Drew Mitchell (the coach’s son had four assists and a quality floor game) and Trent Goldman (a couple of free throws and five rebounds off the bench) were the aforementioned only seniors who played for the Nights.
Leave a Reply