Fairfax beats Serra

SoCal High School & Prep Tourney News

46th Annual Pacific Shores:
Fairfax Wins Championship from Serra--(December 7,1997)

As we stated in the report of the Redondo-Mira Costa Third place game, we just couldn't be at two places at once, and given the weather, we opted for the safer course, and we went to Simi, while Jason Day went to Redondo for the finals of the 46th Annual Pacific Shores Tournament. And as he notes, sometimes there are moments when a Championship game is almost anticlimactic, not because it doesn't feature the same kind of drama you'd find in any good high school game, but because the energy just got sucked out of the room by the game which preceded it. And as you'll see from Jason's report, that's exactly what happened as Fairfax defeated Serra for the Championship. It was still a great game, it's just that the Third place game won by Redondo was such a hard act to follow.

In any event, our congratulations to Fairfax, the 1997 46th Annual Pacific Shores Champions and to Serra, this year's runner-up. Here's Jason's report:

Redondo Beach--Exclusive to SoCalHoops by Jason Day

There are those not so rare occasions when the championship game is a bit anticlimactic when compared to the 3^rd place or consolation game. Such was the case with the Fairfax vs. Serra game for the Pacific Shores Tournament Championship. It followed the Redondo Union High vs. Mira Costa High game for 3^rd place, which was won by Redondo. If you don't believe it, read our report.

Fairfax defeated Mira Costa to get to this game. That was not too hard to believe considering Fairfax coach Harvey Kitani fields a talented athletic team led by two quick guards, Flinder Boyd (6'-0" Sr PG/SG) and Stan Thorne, Jr., (5'-8" Jr PG) , and is anchored by quick athletic forward/wings like Jason Morrisette (6'-4" So SG/F), Tommy Johnson (6'-4" So SG/F) , and Greg Jefferson (6'-5" Sr SG/F). Keep in mind that two of their other guns, Joe Shipp (6'-5" Jr SG/F)--with a broken bone in his foot-- and Diondre Carter (6'-9" Sr C)--for an unknown reason--did not play.

Serra defeated Redondo Union and their probable future high school All American, Andrew Zahn (6'-9" So C), to get to this game. After watching Redondo beat Mira Costa in the 3^rd place game, without Zahn for almost half of the game, and then watching Serra almost hapless against Fairfax, it wasn’t hard to ask how Serra got here.

Fairfax made a statement early, going up 9-0 at 6:29 of the 1^st and forcing Serra coach Dwan Hurt to call an early and heated time out. Apparently the fiery speech, and the change to a full court press, was just what Serra needed to get back in it before Fairfax ran away with the game. It was a fairly close game for the rest of the first half, and Fairfax took a 33-28 lead to the locker room.

When you know you’re gonna report on a game, you tend to search for a theme to best convey your impressions of what you saw. My theme for this game: Fairfax seemed to have a game plan and strategy for the game and they came out and tried to follow the plan and execute the strategy. Serra seemed to be searching for the plan throughout the game and never really found it.

Fairfax has some very talented players, but so does Serra. Davon Johnson (6’-0" Sr PG), who Mike Miller over at West Coast Hoops, has described as "one of the most underrated guards on the West Coast" had an incredible game against Redondo, hitting for 28 points. Aerick Sanders (6’-3" So F), also showed why he’s considered one of the fastest developing sophomore big men in SoCal. Deron Jeter (5’-10" Sr G), a scrappy athletic point with serious hops and aggressiveness came up big time against the Sea Hawks. They’ve also got Palmer Brown (6’-3" Jr G) and Earl Lewis (6’-6" Jr F).

So what happened last night.

Simple. Fairfax had a game plan: Be tough on d and get the ball up and down the court as fast as possible.

Just about every time guard Stan Thorne, touched the ball, he lowered his head and ran away from Serra toward the hole. When he didn’t do that he dished it nicely to the wing and a streaking Morrisette, Jefferson, or Johnson. And for good measure he spotted up 3 times from 3pt range and hit 2 of em. He had 17 pts. (5 for 7 from field, 2 for 3 3’s, and 5 for 5 from FT) 3 rebounds and 3 assists. Flinder ran, Jason ran, everybody ran.

Greg Jefferson, (6’-6 Sr G/W/F--whatever) was named Tournament MVP. He had 13 in this one scoring inside and out, (5 of 9, and 2 of 3 from downtown), 5 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 block, and 1 steal. Not bad for an evenings work. Smooth player, not flashy, just gets the job done. Tommy Johnson was no slouch either. The sophomore guard made Kitani’s day with a great all around performance. He was 5 or 6 from the field, (2 for 2 from 3), 3 for 5 at the line, 15 pts, 2 boards, 1 assist. And I didn’t forget Jason Morrisette who didn’t have a great game scoring, 4 of 10, 2 of 5 from the line for 10 pts. He contributed with his defense and dished 3 assists. He’s so athletic, quick, and aggressive, that defenders have to be worried every time he touches the ball.

For Serra it was just as simple: Davon was only 3 for 16 from the field, but was allowed to keep shooting, and shooting, and shooting. Davon is more of a scorer than a point. He really is an excellent shooter. But he seems to be a much more consistent shooter when he can come off a screen and/or pick once in awhile instead of always having to get his own off the dribble. He’s got a real good handle and the ability to get to the front of the rim almost at will, but against a good help defense he has to distribute on some of those drives and that wasn’t his strength yesterday, and maybe not at all. Geter on the other hand, while not highly skilled yet, is a natural athlete with some good basketball sense. He had some good passes to Sanders inside for scores, to go with some athletic moves to the hoop for his own. He was the only other Cavalier to score in double figures with Sanders, finishing with 13 pts, 2 boards, 1 assist, 1 steal. He’s a tenacious defender who can run the break and make the right decision. While Davon was shooting and missing, Sanders was rebounding and scoring on the put-backs. Sanders is a real slight kid but he plays 2 inches taller and 40 pounds heavier. He had 6 rebounds and 5 blocks to go with his 15 points. If Lewis would have had a better game to give Sanders some help inside, Serra might have given Fairfax more problems. Unfortunately for Serra he had an off game, ending up with only 9 points, shooting 3 for 10 from field--and most of those misses were in the paint part of the "field", which is not a good sign, if you know what I mean--and only 3 rebounds. Palmer Brown was another player having an off night, and he just couldn’t get it going, finishing with only 2 points in 22+ minutes on the floor. So, important players for Serra who usually step it up, just weren't hitting in this one, and they never quite got on track. One more note on the Serra team: They need work on their fundamentals i.e., running the break, inbound passing, picks and coming off picks. They often blew opportunities by making some seemingly pretty basic mistakes. Nothing that a little practice can't cure, but mistakes nonetheless.

After this game I asked a member of Redondo star, Andrew Zahn’s family, how Serra had beaten Redondo in the semis.

He looked at me with a blank stare. . .

Then he simply shrugged his shoulders. I agree.

---Jason Day.