SoCal High School & Prep Report

Valencia Tournament Update: Montclair
Wins In First Round--(December 17,1997)

For such a good team, Montclair Prep from Van Nuys, coached by Howard Abrams, has had a very tough time in several preseason games. They lost at the El Segundo Tournament to South Gate and barely won a few other games. As Rocky Steryo (6'-2" Sr SG) said to LA Times reporter Peter Yoon yesterday, "Our heads kind of blew up at the beginnning of the season with all the articles about Monclair Prep this, and Montclair Prep that. We had a lot of team meetings with coaches yelling at us and we are back down to earth now." Tuesday they managed to show everyone why they may be a potential Division V title challenger by beating Hollywood 76-42 in the 7:30 pm headliner game.

Rocky Steryo, led Montclair with 34 points, making 13 of 26 from the field, while Vahe Melikyan, a new face at Montclair, scored 22 points. Jedediah Hall (6'-71/2" Sr PF/C) , Montclair's super senior tall guy, had 10 points and 10 rebounds, and played well. Jules Thompson (6'-3" Sr F) didn't score, but pulled down 11 boards. Others scoring for Montclair were Chidi Daniel (5'-9" Sr PG) with 4, Micah Cohen (5'-10" Sr PG/SG) with 6, Geoff Hull (6'-2" Sr F) with 8, Jason Anderson (6'-8" Jr PF/C) with 2points, and another newcomer, Prince 3.

This game was only close in the third quarter, and then it was only close because Hollywood managed to win that quarter's scoring by 1 point. On the scoreboard, the game was never close as Montclair jumped out to an 18-8 first quarter lead. In the second quarter it was again all Montclair, as the Mounties and Steryo managed to outscore the Sheiks 18-12, to take a 36 to 20 lead into the locker room at the half. By the end of the third quarter, the score was 47-32, and Montclair closed it out by outscoring in the fourth 28-20.

Montclair improved it's record to 5-1, and will play Birmingham at 6 pm tonight in the second round of the Valencia Tournament.

Hollywood's record dropped to 0-3.

After the game, Coach Howard Abrams told Yoon, "We have had streaks where we've looked great. Now we have to work on making those streaks longer."

In other Valencia Tournament First Round Games:

In the 3:00 pm game, Antelope Valley beat La Salle 70-64 behind Josh Speaks 20 points. Otheres scoring for AV were Edwards with 9, Williams with 6 points, Brown with 11, Roger Price with 16, and 11 boards, and Parm with 8. La Salle led during the first half 23-17, and then stretched that lead to 33-22 with only three minutes to play in the first half, but then AV went on an 18-4 run, and managed to lead at the half 40-37. In the third quarter, no one scored as both teams played great defense and lousy offense. . . well actually AV won the scoring in the quarter 9-5, and stretched their lead to 49-42. La Sall actually staged a comeback of sorts, outscoring AV in the fourth quarter 22-21, but could never quite close that 6 point gap.

With the win, AV's record improved to 5-2, while La Salle's droppped to 3-4.

In the second game of the day played at 4:30, Compton Centennial beat Granada hiss 63-47. Arturo Jones had 16 points and 6 rebounds for Compton, while Marquis Poole thre in another 15. But Centennial was led by Steven Sims with 20 ponts and 6 boards. Brian Johnson of Centennial also had 12 points, in a fairly balanced scoring effort, at least among their starters.

Granada Hills was led by Scott Neumann with 21 points, and he was the only Highlander toscore in double figures. Others were Brown with 7, Pimky with 3, Falcon with 8 points, Gomez with 2, Traditti with 2, Modestov with 2, and Whitehill with 2.

The game was tied at the end of the first quarter, 11-11, and tied at the end of the second 23-23, but in the third quarter, Compton Centennial managed to outscore Granada 19-16 and led by three. In the fourth quarter though, Centennial just turned it up, outscoring Granada by a margin of 21-11, beghing Jones, Poole and Sims fine play.

With the win, Compton Centennial improves to 4-1 for the year, while GH drops to 2-1.

Finally, in the third game of the day (played just before the Monclair v. Hollywood show), Birmingham beat Calabasas, but barely, 56-51. Sahim Massankhail had 19 points while Riley had 8, Salas scored 7. Stanley Fletcher scored 10 points and 8 rebounds, while Emmanual Evans had 12 points for the soon-to-not-be Braves (but that's another story). Calabasas was led by former Maccabi standout player Spencer Harriton (5'-11" Jr. G) with 16 points and Huton Ghoreishi's 19 points and 8 boards. Andy Corcoran had 11 points and 10 rebounds for Calabasas, while another form Maccabi player, Jason Miller (6'-5" Jr. F), had only 2 baskets but pulled down 10 rebounds. Other scorers for Calabasas in the losing effort were Rubin with 2 and Enoch with 1 point.

Birmingham actually trailed at the end of the first quarter 10-6, but managed to make it only a two point game at the half by outscoring Calabasas 17-15. In the third quarter, Birmingham outscored Calabasas 21-15 in the third, to lead by a score of 44- 40. Both teams kept it close, and with Birmingham up by only 3 with 18 seconds left to play, Fletcher nailed a baseline jumper to end the Calabasas threat.

With the win, Birmingham improves to 5-2, while Calabasas drops to 2-4.

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