SoCalHoops High School News

Cerritos Valley Wins Santa
Maria VCA Tournament--(Jan 2, 1998)

The Championship and Consolation Championship in this tournament were played on Wednesday, December 30.  Since we've been doing so much traveling, we weren't able to get the results up until now, but better late than never, right?

Championship:

Cerritos Valley Christian 46, Holy Martyrs 43--In the final game, Cerritos Valley Christian  beat Holy Martyrs 46-43 in a close fought game. Cerritos' Valley Christian's Eric Streelman (6'-5" Sr. F) scored 14 points and grabbed 12 rebounds to lead the Crusaders past the Armens. We were also impressed with Brian Kuyper (6'-6" Sr. C) who played well.  The Long Beach Press-Telegram had this as a consolation game but it was actually the title game, and perhaps the confusion came from the similarity of two of the participating schools, host VCA (Santa Maria Valley Christian) which in fact played against Burbank Providence High for  third place, and Cerritos Valley Christian. CVC beat Buckley in it's only loss in the first round, then beat host VCA in the second round, then beat eventual third place winner Providence in the third round (Providence was seeded No. 1 and received a bye in the second round of this 10 team tournament.  Holy Martyrs beat San Jose Berean, and then beat Mission Prep 57-50 in the third round, also receiving a bye in the second round.

Third Place:

Providence 60, Valley Christian Santa Maria 45-- Providence rolled through it's first game in the tournament against Contra Costa Christian Academy, winning by about 30 points, and then lost to Valley Christian of Cerritos in the third round after receiving a bye in the second round after being seeded as the No. 1 team in the tournament and the defending champions from last year. The loss dropped them into the third place game against the winner of Mission Prep v. VCA Santa Maria;  the latter game was won by VCA 74-65, pitting Providence against host VCA in the third place game played at 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday at VCA. Despite VCA's poor season start (they came into the tournament 0-9) both teams played even at 15-15 in the first quarter, and they stayed even at 25-25 at the half, but ultimately Providence was able to pull ahead in the third, outscoring the Lions 21-14 in the third, and holding them to only 6 points in the fourth, on 14-6 scoring.  Providence was led by Pierre Kascinta (6'-3" Jr. F/C) who scored 20 points, Derek Jones (6'-5" So. F/C) with 12, and Apollo Kascinda (6'-2" Sr. F) with 10.  Others scoring for Providence were Shant Bekmezian (5'-8" Jr. PG) with 9, Dantonio Alvarez (6'-3" Jr. G) with 4, Khiem Nguyen (5'-8" Sr. PG) with 3, and Gino Pedraja (5'-10" Jr. SG) with 2.  Scorers for Valley Chrisian were Aarapm P[jaig (6'-0" Sr. F) with 10, Dave Carnell (6'-0" Jr. G)  with 10, Josh Richards (5'-10" Sr. F) with 9, Mike Christopherson (5'-10" So. G) with 8, Chris Lynwood (5'-10" Fr. G) with 6, and Wade Overton (6'-3" Sr. C) with 2.

Consolation Championship (Fifth Place):

Buckley 61, Grace Brethren 45-- Despite only having one loss in the tournament (as did VCA, but which was placed into the third place game for no apparent reason other than that they were the host team) Buckley won the Consolation Championship in convincing fashion, by 16 points, after leading by more than 20 twice in the game. Buckley's leading scorers and starters were Colin Ward-Henninger (6'-3" So. G/F) who had 17 points and 3 rebounds, Alex Clancy (5'-10" So. SG) who had 13 points (3 threes) and freshman point guard David Gale (5'-10" Fr. PG) also started and played virtually the entire game with the absence of junior Adam Pastor who was still out with a sprained ankle. Gale had 12 assists, 5 rebounds, six steals and 3 points.   Sophomore shooting guard Royal Weaver (5'-10" So. SG) also started but didn't score; he did manage three rebounds and two steals. Senior Sasha Rahban (5'-11" Sr. SG) had 8 points and two steals.   Steven Broukhim (6'-3" So. SG) who came in off the bench, had 14 points and five rebounds.  Only one other player scored for Buckley, Michael Pakravan (6'-1" Jr. F) who had 5 points.

The tip-off in the Consolation Championship game at Santa Maria St. Joseph's last Wednesday

Grace Brethren's Robert Serra (5'-10" Jr. G) elevates for the three point shot

Buckley's Colin Ward-Henninger (6'-3" So. G/F)  contests the rebound against Grace Brethren's John Durso (6'-5" Jr. C)

Buckley's freshman point guard David Gale (5'-10" Fr. PG) drives in the open court

The Buckley team came out in a swarming defense, a matchup-zone, with trapping in the corners, which effectively smothered any semblance of an offense which Grace Brethren might have tried to muster in the first quarter, and at the end of the first quarter, the score was Buckley 18, Grace Brethren 3.  It would take another three minutes into the second quarter with the score 21-3 before Grace's Robert Serra would score again for the Lancers.

David Gale (5'-10" Fr. PG) drives past Grace Brethren's Shawn McClain (6'-1" Jr. F)

Gale feeding the ball to Royal Weaver (center) between two Grace Brethren defenders

In the second quarter, Buckley's Steve Broukhim, who shot 100% in the game (6-6 from the field, 2-2 from three point range) hit 9 of his 14 points to spark another Buckley run, and even though Grace Brethren's McShawn McClain (6'-1" Jr. F) and Robert Serra (5'-10" Jr. SG)-- who the day before had scored 20 points to lead Grace to an overtime win against Contra Costa-- managed to combine for 15 of   Grace's 17 points, Buckley still led 33-20 at the half. In the third quarter, Buckley extended the lead to 48-32, and in the fourth quarter, led by as many as 20 points before Grace Brethren closed the gap, scoring 13 points to Buckley's 12 in the fourth quarter.

Overall, Serra played very well, finishing with 18 points, but it wasn't enough as there were only three other scorers for Grace, McClain who finished with 12, Jackson Beauchamp (6'-0" Jr. G) who finished with 9, and Durso, who finished with 6.

Buckley opens Liberty League play this week with three games, Wednesday, January 6, at Oakwood,  Friday, January 8 against Providence at Providence, and Saturday, January 9 at Yeshiva.  Grace Brethren opens Tuesday, January 5 at First Lutheran.

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