RANCHO CUCAMONGA – How offensively efficient was the Damien High basketball team in the first six minutes of its Baseline League game at Etiwanda Thursday?
So much so that the Spartans hit just eight of their next 30 field goal attempts and still prevailed.
Coach Mike LeDuc’s team hit its first nine field goal attempts (including five 3s from four players) and one of two throws for the game’s first 24 points before heading out the door with the 56-43 victory.
It was the program’s first varsity win in the building in nearly four years and pushed the Spartans – No.’s 22 and 11, respectively, in the latest CIF Southern Section Computer ratings and BurlisonOnBasketball SoCal Top 30 – to 17-4 overall and 2-zip in league.
The Eagles (No.’s 12 and 10 in the same entities) fell to 18-2 and 1-1.
A player who was a seventh grader the last time a Spartans made the trek back to La Verne with a win provided the bulk of their scoring after a first quarter that ended with them up, 26-6.
Zaire Rasshan is one of the top four or five jump shooters in the Southern California Class of 2027; college coaches can buy my scouting service – or they can guess – if they want to know the others I also include in that cluster.
The 6-foot-2 Rasshan (who has hit a combined 28 3s in the Baseline League games and the four Classic at Damien Platinum games) scored a game-high 23 points, including 20 of the 30 the Spartans scored over the final three quarters.
Seniors Eli Garner (14 points – 10 in the first quarter – and 12 rebounds), Elijah Smith (six points, five rebounds and five assists) and Kam Dodson (eight points, including two 3s in that open offensive bonanza, and some nifty half-court and transition passes) also contributed in a lot of ways despite missing a combined 11 of 13 shots from the field over the final three quarters.
The 6-5 Garner (pictured) – among the half-dozen or so of the better unsigned/uncommitted seniors in Southern California – was terrific in the Classic at Damien, averaging 24.3 points, 5.8 rebounds and 2.0 assists in wins over Dallas Parish and Phoenix O’Connor, and tight losses to Redondo Union and Richmond Salesian.
“After playing against that kind of competition, we came in confident that we would play well tonight,” Garner said.
The Eagles were never closer than within 11 points in the fourth quarter but would have cut even deeper into the deficit if not for missing 13 of 27 free throws.
Their often-terrific trio of 10th graders (Devin Mitchell, Achilles Orji and Jacob Coleman) missed a combined 17 of 22 shots from the field.
With the league into its second season with a tournament to dictate a champion and three auto-representatives to the CIF SS playoffs, a Damien-Etiwanda “rematch” can’t come until that league tourney (Jan. 27, 29 and Feb. 3, at sites to be determined) or – much unlikelier – in the playoffs.
A “sleeper” in the Baseline (not to the league’s coaches but to the general high school-following SoCal public) is Chino Hills.
At 21-4 and 2-0, this is the Huskies’ best squad since Onyeka Okongwu led them to their third state title in four seasons seven years ago.
Coach Dennis Latimore’s crew is at Etiwanda Tuesday night and at home to Damien next two nights later.
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