Chaminade v. H-W 206

SoCal High School & Prep Report

Mission League Game: Chaminade Wins Over
Harvard-Westlake Friday Night--(February 6, 1998)

Proving that they deserve the regional No. 1 and CIF Southern Section poll No. 1 rankings, Chaminade capped a virtual lock on first place in the Mission League by defeating Harvard-Westlake in a Mission League game Friday night at Harvard-Westlake. 71-64.

But it was actually much closer than that, and with less then 1:45 to play, the score was actually tied. Chaminade managed to pull this one out because of their better ball control, better rebounding, and by being the beneficiaries of a dwindling clock at the end of the game, which forced H-W to foul, sending Chaminade to the charity line four times in the last minute of the game.

But as Chaminade Coach Jeff Young told me after the game, acknowledging it was a tough game, " It was a win. We'll take it any way we can get it. Even the hard way" And they did. Win that is. Even if freshman Scott Borchart was wearing his shorts backwards. And he did it purposely, actually going with a new trend among younger high school ballers, along with the "cat-in-the-hat" sock popularized by Tony Bland and others.

But this game wasn't about fashion statements. It was about how player like Scott Borchart (6'-8" Fr. F/C) played, not how he dressed, which made all the difference for Chaminade between winning and losing this game. While H-W's big men, Alex Holmes (6'-4" So. PF/C 265 lbs), Pat Biggerstaff (6'-7" Sr. C/PF) and Eric Geffner (6'-5" So. F) were getting the tips, they were just not able to control the boards like Borchart or Scott Long were, and H-W was outrebounded personally by Borchart alone, who had 14 by our count. He was Chaminade's high scorer with 23 points, all from inside the paint except one long 15' j. Borchart showed tonight why he's going to be a major player at a D-I school someday, and maybe into the pro level, as he scored almost at will, made putback after putback, only erring once when he inadvertently goal-tended, and got caught for it. And unlike some of the other players on his team, he has such a great sense of where he is all the time on the court, that you have to remind yourself over and over again that this young man has three more years to hone his skills and improve his game. In one remarkable series, there he was making a defensive block, and then followed with a defensive rebound, controlling the ball, making the outlet to Cayce Cook, who brought the ball up on a fast break, made a no-look pass to. . . Borchart who was already under the basket for the layup. Amazing. He's big, strong, fast, coordinated, and he's just a freshman.

For H-W, it was Russell Lakey (5'-10" So. PG) who led the way, with his superior ball-handling ability, quick first step and deadly shooting, and he hit for 27 points, including three three-pointers. Lakey drove, dished, shot from way outside, and his court presence, vision and ability to push the ball up the court is impressive for a sophomore. His crossover dribble and great ability to use screens and picks, especially those really big ones set by Alex Holmes, kept H-W in the game well into the fourth quarter, at least until Holmes fouled out with 4:35 to play and H-W up by a point. But if Russell also played some of the best defense in the game, forcing Cayce Cook to turn the ball over three consecutive times with quick clean jabs at the ball from behind which knocked it loose each time as Cook was driving to the hole past Lakey, it was also Lakey's usually good free-throw shooting which just killed H-W tonight. The first time he missed from the line occurred with about 5:00 left to play in the fourth quarter, when Russell missed both ends of a technical called against Cook following a foul called against Alex Holmes which sent Borchart to the line for a bonus shot after dropping a layup to give Chaminade the lead by six, 52-48. So Lakey had a chance with the T called on Cook to bring it down to a four point game, but missed both shots. Hmmm, now there's something you don't see everyday. Then at another crucial point in the game, with Chaminade ahead by only three points, 67-64 with 1:06 left to play, Chris Canoles of Chaminade fouled Lakey (picking up his fifth personal), and sending Lakey to the line with a chance to cut the lead to only one. But the usually deadeye shooter missed them both, and with less then a minute to play, Chaminade regained possession of the ball, forcing H-W into a fouling situation just to try to attempt to get the ball back.

But other than a couple of missed free-throws and one or two turnovers here and there, Lakey played almost 4 quarters of flawless basketball, and as good as Cook was, when the two were matched-up against each other, as they were for about four minutes in the fourth quarter, it was clear that Russell was the quicker of the two, able to force the turnover and the steal and clearly frustrating Cook. Which is not to say Cook didn't have a great game: He did. Cook also showed why he's one of the best point guards around, driving well to the basket, and scoring 14 big points from both inside and outside. He doesn't have the same lateral quickness and ability to change directions and tempo like Russell, but he's stronger and better able at this stage of his career to use the drive to his advantage. Both shot well from the outside, and regardless of who "won" the battle of the point guards, it was clear that these are two of the finest players in the region.

For Chaminade there were several other players who had really big games. Robbie Tanouye (5'-9" PG) proved that he's not only a good defender, but that he can also score well, hitting for 10 points, mostly from inside off the dribble, and screens. He's got great speed, a good handle and a nice inside shot, but does not possess the court vision that Cook has, and plays better at the 2 spot when he and Cook are both in together, as they were during the closing minutes of the fourth and earlier in the game. He's a pretty good outside shooter, but for some reason, we don't recall him shooting much from there tonight.

Justin Beach (6'-6" Sr. SG/F) struggled early, threw some wild blocks on defense, almost got a T in the third, and it looked as if he was going to be "Simi'd" again as early in the first quarter he jacked up an airball. Recall that during the Simi Tournament in December, Beach did the same thing in the second quarter (if we recall correctly) and the crowd was merciless to him, and he virtually disappeared from the game as a result. But tonight, he quickly regained his composure, and but for the little shoving incident in the third quarter between he and Pat Biggerstaff and Russell Lakey which went unnoticed and uncalled by the ref's managed to recover as he did hit a three pointer from way outside about three minutes after the airball. And the H-W crowd was a bit more polite (barely) than the Simi crowd who would yell "airball" every time Beach even got near the ball. Tonight, Beach scored 5 points, but was much more effective on defense and setting great screens and picks to help Cook, Tanouye, Long and Stewart do most of the scoring. But by the second quarter, Beach had settled in well, regained his composure, and played smoothly and agressively, grabbing about 10 rebounds by our count, and never again losing his sense of balance on the court. He's obviously becoming a more mature player, and clearly is a major asset to this team, and he complements his co-senior teammate Scott Long very well.

Speaking of Scott Long, (6-5 Sr. PF/C), the Naval Academy-bound player had 8 points and lots of rebounds (we lost count--it must have been about 12 or so though), and he played great defense. He was just not the factor that we would have liked to have seen tonight. He seemed to be all there, but he just did not do as well as expected against the very strong defense of the huge Alex Holmes, who shoved him around and put a body on him very well most of the night.

Justin Stewart (6'-2" Sr. PF) also had a pretty good game, scoring 11 points for Chaminade. Justin is the kind of player who, like tonight, seems sometimes not to be there, but who then just explodes to the basket. For a 6'-2" player, he shows amazing ability to play inside, and has a great vertical which allowed him to get up for a few driving layins and control some rebounds as well. A four year starter on the Chaminade varsity, he may not be the floor leader, but he did display the calm presence you'd expect from a player with his experience, and this really helped Chaminade down the stretch of this game when it was still tied with under 2 minutes to play.

For H-W, the game was marked by great spurts, and great disappearing acts. At times it seemed like H-W was there, and at others, they seemed to just be watching Long and Borchart do their thing on the boards. For example, in the first few minutes of the game, Chaminade struggled tremendously, and with only 3:40 to play in the first quarter, H-W led 10-2. Then Cook hit a three to make it 10-5, which was answered by a Lakey 18' J from the top of the key to make it 12-5 H-W. And then in the next 3 minutes, H-W just disappeard as Chaminade scored the next10 straight points to take the lead. At the end of the first quarter, the score was Chaminade 15, H-W 14. The lead then never changed hands again during the first half, as Chaminade built it's lead with great rebounding and smooth passing, eventually getting it up to 26-18 off Borchart's inside scoring and one very nice outside J' from about 15' out for the Chaminade freshman. Chaminade rattled off a few runs, but then H-W woke up, and at the half, it was only a six point game, 33-27.

The third period started out miserably for H-W, and tremendously strong for Chaminade as Cook hit a three, followed by a Borchart layup, then Cook hit another 2 and suddenly Chaminade led 27-40. But then Todd Kurihawa drove for a beautiful twisting layup through traffic on the left side of the basket, was fouled and made the shot from the line, and it was back to a ten point game 40-30 Chaminade. Kurihawa had 8 points, but he needs to work on his shot selection (at least in our opinion), as he passed up several wide-open looks at the basket in favor of driving in among the trees where he got stuffed repeatedly. And speaking of that, this is something that Karravas also tended to do tonight, causing us to ask, why it is that little guys just love to try to drive through traffic among players who are, in some cases, almost a foot taller. Karavas missed most of his outside shots, scoring 4 points off fast break layups tonight, and maybe he just didn't have the usual confidence in his outside shot that he usually does when they're dropping. That can happen to a player, and when it does, he'll try to force it, which occurred a bit too often tonight for H-W to be successful at it. Karravas did play great defense though, effectively containing Chris Canoles (6'-3" Jr. F/PF) and Ryan Cichon (6'-2" Sr. G/SF), and Cichon showed a disturbing inability to not travel when he had the ball, getting trapped twice in the corner on the right when Chaminade was on offense.

This had to be one of the most exciting fourth quarters we've witnessed this year, marred only by some of the worst refereeing we've seen in a long time, and the bad calls went both ways. There was the one play where a ref was actually watching as two H-W and Chaminade players actually got into a pushing and shoving match as they went up and down the floor, but didn't make any call; and then there was the "mystery" call about halfway through the fourth quarter against no one: With Chaminade on a fast break off a rebound from a John Karravas missed shot, and Chaminade Coach Jeff Young yelling something to his players, one of the refs (yeah, the one with dark hair and a moustache--you know who you are--) blows his whistle, stops play, and then doesn't make any call at all. No explanation, but it was clearly an intentional, not an accidental whistle. So Chaminade misses out on a fast break with the score tied. And these were just the most obvious of a series of absolutely terrible calls which went against both teams. No way Holmes or Canoles should have fouled out. Really cheesy calls. And any time you see a game fought so intensely and so well, and played by such a great group of athletes, you hate to see the refs' calls swaying the outcome of the game, especially in a one or two point game. That's the soapbox for tonight.

There were obviously others who contributed for both teams. Alex Minn (6'-1" Jr. SG) played very well, and hit two threes and a very long two point j from way outside in the last three minutes of the fourth quarter, and in fact he was single-handedly responsible (as least from a scoring perspective) with bringing H-W back into the game and tying it up with less than two minutes to play. He scored 12 very important points, and played well. Now if he could only turn the "three machine" on a bit earlier in the game.

Pat Biggerstaff (6'-7" Sr. C/PF) again lived up to his name, playing very big inside but only scoring 6 points, he was both blocked and did his own share of blocking, stripping Borchart once and then Long on defensive rebounds. We only wish that he was in the game more, as H-W's rotation seemed to take him out of the game way too early. He was really the only player tonight for H-W who was effectively managing to rattle and take Borchart out of his game. Eric Geffner (6'-5" So. F) played about as well as we've seen him play, but he didn't get the ball at all from those at the point or SG spots, even when he was wide open at the wing. Geffner's usually a pretty good outside three-point shooter, sort of the 6'-5" "Vlade" of H-W, but we heard that his shot has been off lately, and he only managed to score a layup for two tonight. Geffner is young, still growing, and showed his defensive quickness and agility tonight, by getting tip after tip on both the offensive and defensive boards. Now, if he could only grab it instead of tipping. . . Eric is showing tremendous promise though, and for a young man who clearly will still fill out his frame has great footspeed and lateral quickness and is a great shot blocker.

Alex Holmes played his usual tough inside game, but only scored 3 points, and was having a bit of difficulty scoring against the taller Chaminade players inside. When he was in, and when he was "on" though, he played great defense, even once pretending to play football, putting all 240 of his lbs. directly on top of Justin Stewart fighting for a loose ball. We love the way this guy plays, but he clearly had an "off" night in the scoring department.

The only other scorer for Harvard-Westlake was Anthony Naylor (6'-3" So. F), who scored two on a driving layup, drew a foul and missed the extra point attempt. Naylor wasn't in the game long, but when he was he demonstrated that he's maturing nicely, can jump like crazy, and will obviously be a big contributor for H-W in coming years. John Terzian (5'-11" Sr. PG/SG) was the only other H-W player who made it into the rotation, and he came into the game only during the last two minutes of the first half, and didn't score. We don't remember Dan Kinzer (6'-7" Jr. F) in the game either, and against a team as big as Chaminade, we wondered why, but then Hilliard was doing pretty well anyway with his 7 or 8 man rotation. For Chaminade, JJ Todd (6'-10" Jr. C) got a couple of minutes also in the first half, and Mike Kokorowski (6'-2" Sr. G) also played, although only the last 14 seconds of the game, and neither scored.

Oh, and we didn't spot Victor Munoz anywhere tonight. Maybe he was just coming off the surgery, and frankly we didn't get a chance to ask Hilliard about it. Strange though not to see Victor somewhere around this game tonight.

So with the win, Chaminade is now 21-1 on the season, 10-0 in Mission League play, and would seem to have a solid lock on the league title. H-W is now 17-7 overall and dropped to 5-5 in league play, but still has a good chance to take third in league and make it into the playoffs if it can win it's next two games.

So what do we know after this game? That H-W is still an impressively good team made up mostly of sophomores and juniors, with only one or two seniors thrown in, that almost (horseshoes and hand-grenades) won this game. Maybe next year. We also know that Chaminade is one really talented team, which should go very deep in the playoffs, possibly challenging for a Southern Section title and state championship in Division III against the likes of USDHS. Wow, now there's a matchup to think about, Luke, Kam & Chris, Ronnie McM & David A against Borchart, Long, Stewart & Beach, Cook & Co. And with Chaminade's deep bench, which stretches 16 deep (so deep in fact that there weren't enough chairs tonight for all the players and coaches traveling with the Eagles), we'd have to give them the edge, but then David Abramowitz is really one hell of a point guard and might just be unstoppable by Chaminade's guards. Hope we get to see it.