BELLFLOWER, CA – There are three CIF Southern Section leagues in which boys’ basketball games, at this point of the season, impact not only league championships but the makeup of the Open Division playoffs, too.
One of those was played at St. John Bosco High Wednesday night.
And the 55-30 victory over the Santa Margarita Eagles moved the host Braves a notch closer to a Trinity League title and a spot in the eight-team Open Division playoffs next month.
Depending on your perspective, a team can’t play much better defensively than did Coach Matt Dunn’s team did in improving to 20-3 overall and 5-0 in league – or much more less productively than did Justin Bell’s now 20-4 and 4-1 squad.
*The first quarter ended with the Braves up by 12 points – not 18-6, nor 16-4 or 14-2 . . . 12-zip.
The Eagles missed six field-goal attempts, both free throws and committed six turnovers in the quarter.
*The visitors didn’t score until 25 seconds into the second quarter, when 6-foot-8 senior Rockwell Reynolds converted a left-handed layup after picking up a loose ball.
*At intermission, the score was St. John Bosco 26, Rockwell Reynolds 11. The only player to score besides Reynolds was junior guard Jonathan Moxie, who hit the second of two free throws with 1:15 to go in the quarter – during which they committed another six turnovers.
*Six-nine Xinyi Li (pictured), whose progress since enrolling at the school late in the summer (he came from a prep school in Utah) has gone from “steady” to “remarkable”, started the game scoring on two hard drives right at Reynolds.
He added seven points in the third quarter, opening with a 3-pointer and closing it with a layup at the buzzer after an inbound pass from Jack Turner.
*Reynolds (who finished with 22 of his team’s points) scored seven of the Eagles’ third-quarter points – junior Cameron McNamee the only teammate to score in the quarter, via two free throws with 2:48 to go.
*And Santa Margarita didn’t score its first “non-Reynolds” bucket until freshman Dizz Kyman hit a layup with 3:42 to go in the game and didn’t knock in its first – and only – jump shot until Kyman hit a 3 from the left corner 44 seconds later.
The Eagles’ offensive totals: ten of 32 from the field, nine of 17 from the free-throw line and 18 turnovers.
And that’s from a team that has won 20 games, in large part by way of its half-court offensive execution that usually resulted in high-percentage shots from Reynolds (who did hit eight of 14 from the field) and a hefty number of 3-point buckets.
“We wanted to pressure their guards and not let them get into their (half-court) offense,” Dunn said afterward.
“And we wanted to take away their 3-point shooting. A big part of their success has come become of that (shooting). We knew it is so difficult to guard Reynolds, 1 on 1. But Li and (6-7 sophomore) Kade (Bonam) did as good a job as possible, with some help if we got back to their shooters quickly.”
Sophomore guard Elzie Harrington (14 points, even rebounds, three assists and three steals), Turner (nine points, five rebounds and five assists) and Bonam (only four points and four rebounds Wednesday but the team’s top scorer and rebounder on the season) – as returning starters – have played pretty much to the level expected of them.
But three reasons why the Braves were unbeaten in the first half of league, and on track to return to the Open playoffs (they didn’t make the cut last season and lost in the semifinals of the D-1 bracket) with a Top 5 or better seed, has been the addition of three players.
There’s the obvious one – Li, whose impact as a rebounder and defender, and as one of more offensively “skilled” players at his size in Southern California, is more apparent with each game.
And 6-3 senior D.J Harrington – Elzie’s cousin – became eligible after Christmas following his transfer from Valley Christian.
And a couple of weeks ago, 6-3 Brandon McCoy – a highly gifted freshman from Oakland – enrolled and became eligible.
McCoy, already the best “basketball athlete” in the league, scored 17 points off the bench against Vanden during the MLK Classic Monday at SJB, and 15 more the previous last Friday in a Trinity game with Orange Lutheran.
Wednesday night, he scored six points but also crisply demonstrated the impact he’s capable of having as a rebounder, defender, and playmaker, with five rebounds, two steals and three assists.
The second round of Trinity play begins Friday night, with St. John Bosco (No. 5 in the BurlisonOnBasketball SoCal Top 25) playing host to Servite, and Santa Margarita (No. 9) at home to third-place (14-7 overall and 3-2 in league) Orange Lutheran, which is No. 22 in the SoCal ratings.
In other key games Wednesday night:
*No. 2 Harvard-Westlake 85, No. 11 Sherman Oaks Notre Dame 78 (2OT): The visiting Wolverines had to dig deep to pull out this Mission League clash.
They’ll be on their Studio City campus Friday night for another mega-Mission matchup, this one with No. 6 Sierra Canyon.
*Damien 64, No. 21 Rancho Cucamonga 53: The rapidly improving Spartans won their 12th consecutive game to improve to 20-2 overall and 4-0 in the Baseline League behind 22 points from sophomore center Nate Garcia and 21 from junior guard Xavier Clinton.
They will be at home Friday night to take on No. 10 Etiwanda (16-4 and 4-0). They shared the league title last season.
*No. 14 La Mirada 63, Downey 56 (ot): The Matadores had a 19-point advantage in the third quarter but needed an extra four minutes to hold off the visiting Vikings in a Gateway League game. La Mirada (18-6 and 4-0; No. 2 in the CIF SS 2A coaches’ poll) and Downey (20-2 and 3-1; No. 5 in the 2A ratings) are set for a rematch, at Downey, on Feb. 3 in a regular-season finale.
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