THE HIGH SCHOOLS : Foul Deed at Birmingham Still a Mystery to Boykin

Shelton Boykin, a 6-4 center nicknamed The Force by teammates at San Fernando High, was rendered nearly powerless Saturday. Although he was physically fit, he could barely move from his room, and his enthusiasm for basketball was all but shot.

“I thought to myself when I got up today, ‘Why don’t I quit?’ ” Boykin said. “I was thinking, ‘Why play basketball? I don’t even want to go to college and play.’ ”

The source of Boykin’s anguish was Friday night’s 65-64 loss at Birmingham. Did Boykin take the defeat hard?

“I’m done. I feel like I’m going to die. This is the hardest loss emotionally I’ve had in my career. I run hills to stay in shape, and I do my schoolwork just so I can play 32 minutes of basketball. This really took a lot out of me,” he said.

Boykin was the central figure in a controversial play that ended the game in outrage for San Fernando. With Birmingham leading, 65-64, San Fernando worked for the game’s final shot, but guard Sean DeClouet missed an outside jumper with six seconds left and Tory Stephens also missed with a follow-up shot.

Boykin grabbed that rebound and put the ball in the basket before the final buzzer, but the officials, ruling he went over the top of a Birmingham player, disallowed the basket.

The identity of the fouled Birmingham player remains a mystery because the officials ended the game on the play, granting no one-and-one free-throw opportunity to Birmingham.

“I still want to know who I fouled. I jumped straight up. I didn’t feel anybody or see anybody. I wanted to ask the refs but they ran a 9.4 sprint out of the gym.”

Boykin, who scored 19 points Friday and averages a team-high 17 points, took solace in one fact: San Fernando gets Birmingham in its own gym Jan. 30.

“This is going to stay with me until I play Birmingham again,” he said.

Quick recovery: Cleveland had its best offensive game of the season in Friday’s 95-52 win at Hamilton. But Cleveland, 9-2 and the No. 1 team in The Times Valley poll, continues to have trouble keeping Damon Greer healthy.

Greer made his second start Friday since missing six games with a sprained right wrist, but the 6-1 junior guard left the game 30 seconds into the third quarter after colliding headlong into a wall. Greer was knocked unconscious for a few seconds and sat out the rest of the game.

On Saturday, however, he was on the playground playing basketball and said he’d be ready for practice Monday.

Differential equation: Canyon Coach Greg Hayes pointed to the performance of two players who combined for just two points as the key to Friday’s 59-54 victory over Antelope Valley.

Andy Boron, a linebacker on the football team, and David Nash were instrumental in a 13-2 third-quarter run that wiped out a five-point deficit.

“We have a team statistic that measures point differential and tells us what the change in the score is when a player is in the game,” Hayes said. “Andy had a plus 12 and David was plus 10. I thought they helped us win it with their defense.”