Health & Fitness
Trojans Fall to Bigger Cavaliars 70-52 in CIF Final
Serra uses its size and depth and claimed its second consecutive Division 4AA title, and its seventh overall
ANAHEIM - For the second year in a row, La Verne Lutheran faced Serra for the CIF 4AA title, and for the second year in a row it was Serra who prevailed 70-52 Saturday afternoon at Anaheim Arena.
This year’s team is a revamped squad, including a new head coach and returned two players from last year’s team which made it all the way to the final round before losing to Serra 69-59.
With most of last year’s team gone because of graduation or transfer, the team had to look elsewhere to field a team, including its number eight player, a walk-on whose “best sport is rugby,” said first year head coach Brandon Lee with a laugh.
Find out what's happening in Claremont-La Vernefor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Serra set the pace as the Cavaliers opened the game on a 6-0 run before Lutheran knew what hit it. However Jay Miller’s jumper with 6:10 remaining in the first quarter got the Trojans on the board. Joseph rushing’s
3-pointer on the very next play closed the gap to 6-5. Serra closed out the
quarter by outscoring the Trojan 9-8.
They played an exceptional game,” Lee said. "We had a game plan, but their size, strength and speed completely disrupted everything we did. You have to rebound and take care of the ball, neither of which we did.”
Find out what's happening in Claremont-La Vernefor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Skyler Williams led all scorers with 20 points while Miller added 11 points. McKay Anderson tallied 8 points and four rebounds in the losing effort.
La Verne got as close as 17-15 to open the second quarter, but that is close as they will be able to get as Serra responded to any runs by the Trojans with runs of their own, with its size and depth advantage eventually taking a toll on the smaller, undermanned Trojans side.
“Their size was not an issue,” Williams said. “We have beaten bigger teams before. It’s just that we didn’t come ready to play. We have not played on this stage before, but we should have come out and play our regular game, but we didn’t.”
Miller added “Despite everything that happened to us we came a long way to get this far.”
The Trojans finished 25-7 and now awaits to see if it will get a berth into the state tournament.
BOX SCORE
SERRA (70) – Ron Freeman (16), Ajon Jefferson (15), Ellis Salahuddin (11), Jason Richardson (8), Tavrion Dawson (8), Emmanual Mdumanya (7), Adoree Jackson (3), Roland Wyatt (2)
La VERNE LUTHERAN (52)- Skylar Williams (20), Jay Miller (11), McKay Anderson (8), Joseph Rushing (7), Tay Williams (2), Aaron Provence (2), Ashon Provence (2)