Long Beach Poly, Lynwood advance to CIF championships

It wasn’t pretty or easy, but the Long Beach Poly boys basketball team came out on top in a CIF-SS Division 1AA semifinal against Rancho Verde on Friday night. The Jackrabbits won a low-scoring nailbiter, 47-44.

Poly advanced to the 1AA championship game, which will be played next Friday or Saturday against J.W. North. The Jackrabbits are seeking a record 21st CIF championship.

“It’s just a blessing,” said Poly coach Shelton Diggs, who is trying to win a second title in his first three years as head coach. “This is Poly, this is what it’s about. All credit to the kids. At the same time, we were put in Division 1 and got the top seed. All we’ve done is what we were supposed to do.”

Poly (20-9) did well handling the Mustangs’ motion offense, which they often run for 20 seconds before looking to shoot, resulting in low-scoring, grinding games. The Jackrabbits took a 14-3 lead in the first quarter as Hawaii-bound guard Drew Buggs had no problem picking apart the Mustangs’ defense and setting his teammates up for layups.

But despite trailing 28-18 in the third quarter, the Mustangs continued to chip away at the Poly lead, and eventually came within two points early in the fourth quarter. The Jackrabbits only scored nine points in the final quarter, but held off the Mustangs, thanks to some big plays down the stretch.

The Jackrabbits had an unlikely hero in Garrison Gowens, a senior who’s averaged two points per game this year. Gowens had Poly’s first six points in the fourth quarter, all on put-back buckets.

“I was just trying to be the glue guy and get us a win,” he said with a shrug.

Buggs missed three straight free throws down the stretch, including the front end of two one-and-ones, but Poly got the offensive rebound on both of those shots. Still, the Mustangs had the ball with less than thirty seconds, down by just three points.

Fortunately for Poly, Diggs had them practice for the play the Mustangs ended up ruing just earlier that day. Zafir Williams read it immediately, and popped out from behind a screen to intercept the flare pass.

“It’s like a teacher, when you teach your kids something and it’s on the test and they get it right, you’re just so happy for them,” said Diggs.

“We worked on that play all day,” said Williams. “As soon as I saw the screen come at me I knew what they were doing and I jumped it.”

‑ Mike Guardabascio

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J.W. NORTH 78, ST. JOHN BOSCO 51 >> It seemed like nothing was going right for the St. John Bosco boys basketball team.

J.J. Watson - the team’s leading scorer - couldn’t buy a bucket. And the Braves struggled to get into a flow offensively, tuing the ball over 15 times, due to the immense physicality the Huskies brought to the court.

Add the bad offensive night with a great shooting performance from J.W. North and you have a recipe for defeat.

That’s exactly what happened to St. John Bosco, as it dropped its Division 1AA semifinal contest.

“They were really good tonight,” SJB coach Matt Du said of North. “They retu four starters off of an Open Division team and we weren’t going to beat them playing at that level.”

North closed the opening half on a 15-4 run to take a 38-26 lead into the break and St. John Bosco never recovered.

Despite the bitter end to the season, Du summed up his first year at the helm for the Braves as a positive one.

“I thought we improved an incredible amount,” he said. “It’s really hard to have a coach for a first year and if you would’ve told me when the year started that we’d win 21 games and make the semifinals, I probably would’ve taken it.”

‑ Devin Ugland

Division 2A

LYNWOOD 64, HART 61 >> The Knights advanced to the championship game thanks in part to a big night from freshman point guard Oscar Lopez, who had 17 points and eight rebounds. Jamal Bogan chipped in 16 points and 10 rebounds to help boost the Knights.

SANTA BARBARA 62, LA MIRADA 57 >> The defending state champions fell to Santa Barbara to end their season.

Open Division

REDONDO UNION 77, COMPTON 59 >> The Tarbabes fell in the consolation bracket semifinals, but are a lock for a state berth and will await the state pairings a week from Sunday.

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