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SoCal Prep & High School Report

Liberty League Game: Buckley
Wins Over Avalon--(February 13, 1998)

Round one: Avalon comes to Buckley, all set to play two games. Buckley is, we think, at 6-5 in league going into the game. Avalon is supposed to be pretty hot, having defeated Holy Martyrs on the island of Catalina once, splitting their series. We saw the Buckley v. Holy Martyrs game last week, and we thought it might look pretty bleak for a playoff spot if Avalon was, as the Holy Martyrs' coach told us "better" than HM was against Buckley. We hadn't seen any of the Avalon players, and frankly, we really didn't get much of a chance tonight. Here's what happened. After leaving the Grant game, we drove across the Valley (all the while getting a report on our cell phone about the Harvard-Westlake v. Crespi game--more on that later--Harvard won, clinching third place in the league, and the score was something like 72-63, at least that's what we heard, but it's probably way off because of a terrible connection. Apparently Russell Lakey had another big night, hitting for something like 29 points (maybe), but we know he went to the line 18 times. Again, we'll have a full report on this one tomorrow). Anyway, we made it to Buckley with time still left on the clock in the fourth quarter, just enough time to see Buckley seal the win over Avalon 65-59.

We didn't get much of a chance to see either team in action, as it was late in the fourth quarter by the time we arrived, but Buckley had the game well in hand, up by at least 10 points. We got a brief look at some of the Avalon guys, and we'll have a better look tomorrow morning at 10:30 am as the second game gets underway. That second game had originally been scheduled for 12:00 noon, but the CIF required that the schools advance the time, so that it would be concluded before 12:30, the cut-off deadline for all regular season games. Avalon looks like a pretty strong team, with good height, quickness and speed. We're not sure of their shooting, or the style of play, and so we'll wait until tomorrow to let everyone in on it rather than guessing.

According to Buckley Coach Dan Haasch, the Griffins are assured of at least a "coin toss" for a playoff spot at this point, but with a win tomorrow, they'll definitely make the playoffs. For those interested in seeing some pretty good small school action tomorrow morning, the game will be at Osaga School (formerly Corvallis High), which is located on Laurel Canyon just south of Ventura (on the west side of the Laurel). Why is it there? Because Buckley's CUP doesn't permit games to be played on Saturday--too much traffic and too many complaints from the neighbors (boo, hiss). So instead of having a "home" game, it's really played on almost a nuetral court. A nice gym, but not quite a "home" game.

Buckley came back from a deep deficit on the fine play of Colin Ward-Henninger (6'-5" Fr. F/C) who had 17 points, matching Avalon's Leonhardi. Senior Josh Gerson (6'-3" Sr. F) had 12 oints, while Adam Pastor (5'-11" So. PG) had 12, and Sasha Rahban (5'-10" Jr. SG) had 11. Others scoring for Buckley were Lupu with 2, Grewal with 9, and Howard with 2.

For Avalon, most of the damage was done by a player named Tilly, who scored 21 points. Others scoring in addition to Tilly and Leonhardi were Hernandez with 6, Marincovich with 3 and White with 12.

We'll have a full report on these guys after tomorrow's game, as well as a report on who makes it to the playoffs, and who gets to do a whole lot more studying for finals after Satruday's game. Stay tuned.