Crowe hits a 50-banger in win over Cypress

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REDONDO BEACH  – Jason Crowe Jr. continued his assault on California’s career scoring record Monday night at Redondo Union on the first day of the Ryse Williams/Pac Shores Showcase.

The 6-foot-3, left-handed senior guard scored 50 points while leading Inglewood past Cypress, 95-80, to improve to 5-0 with the Sentinels’ next game set for Wednesday night at George Washington Prep in Los Angeles.

Crowe, who plans to attend the University of Missouri for his freshman season next year, is 121 points short of surpassing Santa Maria St. Joseph’s Tounde Yessoufou (now a freshman at Baylor) as California’s top scorer.

In other results Monday,  Bishop Montgomery improved to 6-0 after beating San Gabriel Academy, 55-48, in the other “showcase” portion of the event.

In the first round of the eight-team tournament, St. Monica trimmed L.A. University, 53-45; Millikan held off Beverly Hills, 59-55; Palos Verdes topped Oakwood, 83-71; and Leuzinger outscored Chino, 81-71.

Cypress (4-1), which is back in action at Servite Tuesday night at 7, was in front Monday night, 23-10, before the Sentinels used four Centurions’ turnovers to close the first quarter on a 12-zip run.

And they ratcheted the full-court pressure when play resumed, continuing a run that was finally capped at 24 by a layup by Cypress senior point guard Ryan Gov (who finished with 18 points and eight assists).

Crowe finished a first half that ended with his team up, 48-39, with 25 points by way of seven of 18 from the field and 10 free throws in a row after missing his first attempt.

The Sentinels were up 19 points going into a final eight minutes that were a flurry of transition layups, with the Centurions hitting their first 10 shot attempts while cutting their deficit to nine points with about four minutes to go.

Crowe hit 18 of 31 shots from the field (including four 3s) and his final 20 free throws with five steals while 6-foot-7 junior teammate David Conerly all 24 of his points over the final three quarters.

Senior forwards Gavin Kroll (21 points) and Emmanuel Igbekoyi (16) scored 37 points for Cypress while hitting a combined 17 of 26 from the field.

Millikan led by 15 points after the first quarter before trailing by as many as two points, twice, late in the fourth quarter.

Senior Joseph Wicker’s 3-pointer from the left wing put the Rams back in front to stay (54-52) with 1:01 remaining.

Wicker scored 20 points while freshman teammate Quali Giran (pictured) had a game-high 25 with multiple spectacular finishes in the team’s first win after losses to Sierra Canyon, Inglewood and Harvard-Westlake.

Sophomore guard R.J. Ball led Beverly Hills with 11 points.

Junior forward Tarron Williams scored a game-high 19 points and sophomore guard Austin Kirksey added 13 as Bishop Montgomery never trailed in dropping San Gabriel Academy to 0-3.