Prep Basketball : Garden Grove League Roundup : Kennedy Slows Up Campbell, Stops La Quinta

Kennedy High School resorted to a simple tactic to stop La Quinta’s high-scoring Scott Campbell Friday night. For the most part, Kennedy left him alone.

That’s not to say Kennedy ignored Campbell. The Fighting Irish just didn’t overextend themselves trying to stop him.

Instead, the Fighting Irish, playing a basic 2-3 zone, concentrated on playing solid team defense.

The plan worked as Kennedy held Campbell to 25 points and upset the Garden Grove League-leading Aztecs, 74-64, at La Quinta.

Campbell came into the game as Orange County’s leading scorer, averaging 32 points a game. In the teams’ first meeting this season, won by La Quinta, 75-72, Campbell had 36 points.

“We made a mistake the first time we played them,” Kennedy Coach John Mayberry said. “We tried to play Campbell too close. This time we just played good team defense.”

The Fighting Irish had a few shaky moments in their zone in the first quarter as La Quinta made one pinpoint pass after another, setting up easy layups.

La Quinta ran out to a quick 11-5 lead, but Kennedy rallied and by halftime the Fighting Irish led, 35-30, and never trailed thereafter.

Kennedy pushed its lead to 10 points, 52-42, to begin the fourth quarter and weathered every run La Quinta made in the late going. It certainly didn’t hurt that Kennedy made 10 of 12 free throws in the fourth quarter.

Greg Hansell, Kennedy’s senior forward, anchored the defense and controlled the backboards.

Hansell had 21 points, 21 rebounds and 6 blocked shots. His point total was a season high and he couldn’t have picked a better time to record it.

“It was a real team effort,” Hansell said. “I just got there for a couple of real easy shots.”

Hansell was a terror inside. He scored most of his points on short banks and follow shots.

All 5 Kennedy starters scored in double figures, contributing to Kennedy’s “team effort.” Jim Barker added 14 points, Tom Deep 13, Mike Pettengill 12 and Jeff Williams 11.

Kennedy is 14-7 overall, 7-2 in league play. The Fighting Irish are tied with Pacifica (also 7-2) for second place. La Quinta (13-5, 8-1) remains in first.

The only thing keeping Kennedy from a first-place tie with La Quinta is a 37-35 overtime loss to Garden Grove.

“We’ve played with a lot of intensity since then,” Mayberry said. “We could have gone into the tank after that, but we’ve bounced back. This was very important to us heading into the playoffs.”

Pacifica 79, Los Amigos 55--Carlos Palomino of Los Amigos scored a basket to tie the game at 2, then Pacifica ran off the next 11 points en route to its victory. Los Amigos missed 9 consecutive shots during Pacifica’s run. Palomino led all scorers with 31 points, hitting 12 of 22 shots from the field. Center Randy Schulze paced Pacifica with 18 points, including 13 in the first quarter when the Mariners opened a 24-9 lead.

Bolsa Grande 50, Garden Grove 49--Forward Chris Rosener scored 20 points for Bolsa Grande (2-14, 1-8).

Rancho Alamitos 93, Santiago 66--Guard Gary Lira scored 26 points and teammate David Green added 14 points for Rancho Alamitos (7-9, 5-4). Jason Heskett led Santiago (1-13, 1-8) with 16 points.