SACRAMENTO – The Harvard-Westlake boys basketball team had to do a lot of digging to pull out its three wins in the past eight nights.
And the kid with the biggest shovel in the gut-crunching wins over Carlsbad, Roosevelt and, finally, Salesian of Richmond Saturday night in the CIF State Open Division championship game was Trent Perry.
The USC-bound and McDonald’s All-American guard scored the game’s final six points – and came up with a major league hustle play – to lead the Wolverines to a 50-45 victory in the Golden 1 Center.
Coach David Rebibo’s crew became only the second program to win back-to-back Open titles since the division began with the 2013-14 season.
The Wolverines (33-3) won the title in the same building a year ago while knocking off St. Joseph of Santa Maria, 75-65.
A couple of hours earlier, Etiwanda’s girls won their second Open title in a row with a surprisingly lopsided victory over unbeaten San Jose Mitty, 60-48.
Perry scored 16 points with 10 rebounds and eight assists in the 2023 win over St. Joseph.
And the Wolverines even more heroics out of him just to earn the return trip to Sacramento.
*Despite trailing by 13 points in the first half, Harvard-Westlake rallied to edge San Diego Open champion Carlsbad, 73-72, behind Perry’s 42 points on March 2.
Then, three nights later, the Wolverines needed Perry’s 28 points and late-game, huge shot-making to come from 12 points down in the third quarter and knock off CIF SS Open runner-up Roosevelt, 63-59.
Despite taking a 10-point advantage after the first quarter Saturday night, they were going to need Perry’s late-game magnificence once more to knock off a 31-1 opponent that is the best team produced in Northern California in a long while
And, when superb sophomore Elias Obenyah flipped in 5-footer, it gave the Pride a 45-44 lead and put them just 1:30 away from pulling out yet another of the defensive, grind-it-out wins they’d specialized in this season.
But it was “winning time”, aka, “Perry Time” for the Wolverines.
Using his powerful speed dribble to sprint to the rim, Perry scored to give his team the lead back with 1:18 to go, with Rebibo immediately calling time out.
When play resumed, Obenyah (who finished with a team-high 14 points) tried to drive around a defender about 17 feet away but the ball was jarred loose, Perry diving to the floor and securing the ball just long enough for Rebibo to call – and be granted – a timeout with 56 tics to go.
Perry wasn’t done yet.
After the ball was inbounded, the Wolverines moved the ball rapidly around the perimeter. When the ball was back in Perry’s hands , he took a jab step at defender Amani Johnson and rose for a 14-footer over the top of Johnson’s hand.
Swish! Three-point lead, 25 seconds to go.
Salesian Coach Bill Mellis called a timeout to explain the offensive options to his players, which likely centered around getting some motion and screening to open a player for a possible tying 3 – or, perhaps, a quick drive for a score.
It appeared the option that Pride ended up with was a possible 3 from the left side of the key by Obenyah but a kickout pass by senior guard Aaron Hunkin-Claytor sailed just beyond his reach and out of bounds .
Perry was fouled immediately after the inbound pass, swished the final two free throws – and points – of his high school career, 9.5 seconds before the back-to-back celebration began.
If not for another senior, Robert Hinton, even Perry’s late game schtick wouldn’t have been enough to bring another hunk of state championship wood and metal back to Studio City.
The 6-5 Hinton scored 19 points – 15 in the first half – and missed his only shot in eight field-goal tries and four free-throw attempts on a short jumper with a little more than a minute to go.
The Etiwanda-Mitty clash was expected to go down to the wire, in much the same fashion of their showdown in this building a year ago – with the Eagles prevailing, 69-67, on a buzzer-beating follow shot.
But, surprisingly, the “rematch” was one-sided from the get-go, with the overall quickness and physicality of the 32-3 Eagles denying the Monarchs get any kind of rhythm at both ends of the floor.
The leads after the first three quarters were six, 16 and 21 points – with the advantage at 24 late in the third quarter.
The Monarchs – who came into the building 30-0 – finally made a run, extending their defense with some pressure and sound traps, forcing multiple turnovers that led to a lot of transition layups.
They got as close as to within 11 points with a bit more four minutes to go.
But senior McDonald’s All-American Kennedy Smith responded with a powerful baseline drive and finish, and dazzling sophomore guard Puff Morris nailed a 3 to get the edge back to 16 points and take some steam of out of the largely pro-Mitty crowd.
Smith, who is headed to USC and is the favorite to bag State Player of the Year honors, closed her superb prep career with 15 points, five rebounds, two assists and four blocked shots.
Morris scored 20 points with six rebounds , five assists and two steal, while 6-4 junior center Gracie Knox had eight points and 11 rebounds.
In the other four finals played Saturday:
BOYS
D-II
Oakland Tech 79, Bakersfield Centennial 55: The Dynamic Duo of junior guards Ardarius Grayson and Caleb Rollins proved too quick and too good for the Golden Hawks to overcome in their first trip to a state championship game.
Grayson scored 20 points with 12 rebounds, seven assists and five steals while Rollins also had 20 points while adding two steals and two assists for the Bulldogs (30-5), victorious for the first time in three title games.
Senior forward Rippen Gill led Centennial (28-8) with 22 points.
D-IV
Monterey 74, Chatsworth 66: Sophomore Alijah Arenas scored 44 points, but the division’s championship single-game scoring record wasn’t enough to keep the balanced scoring effort of the Toreadores from winning in their first title-game appearance.
Coach Greg Clark’s team (25-6) got 22 points from junior guard Kavon Collins (a heavily recruited wide receiver) and a combined 37 points from brothers Ryan and Joshua Roth.
Joshua, a 6-4 junior, hit five 3s en route to 19 points.
The Chancellors (20-15), also in their first state title appearance, got nine points, 19 rebounds and nine blocked shot by from 6-8 junior Taj Unuakhalu, the L.A. City Open Division volleyball Player of the Year last spring after leading his team to a section championship.
GIRLS
D-II
Studio City Harvard-Westlake 60, Colfax 45: Down four points at intermission, the Wolverines took a two-point edge into the fourth quarter before pulling away and winning the second state title for Coach Melissa Hearlihy.
The Wolverines, with six freshmen and three sophomores on their roster, finished 19-18 after losing 13 of their first 17 games.
One of those ninth graders, 5-9 Angelina Habis, scored a game-high 19 points (with seven rebounds and three) steals with junior Deanna Thompson adding 18 points and sophomore Valentina Guerrero 14.
Junior center Juliette James scored 18 points with 11 rebounds for the Falcons (34-3), who are 2-3 in state championship games.
D-IV
Eureka St. Bernard’s 47, El Cajon Grossmont 29: The Crusaders (30-5) broke out to an 11-point advantage at intermission and coasted to the win in their first-ever state championship game appearance.
Laila Florvilus (game-high 18 points), Madelyn Shanahan and Samantha Sundberg combined for 45 points and 42 rebounds for the winners.
Senior Kellan Hayden (10 points) was the only player to score in double figures for the Foothillers (27-9), who were also making their first-ever state championship game appearance.
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