PREP NOTES : Team Heeds Coach’s Advice, Shooter Gets Ball

After Rolling Hills High lost in overtime to Morningside, 76-68, two weeks ago in the Pacific Shores Basketball Tournament, Coach Cliff Warren said his team needed to do a better job of getting shots for guard Steve Clover.

Judging by Clover’s performance in the Beverly Hills Tournament last week, the Titans are succeeding.

The 6-foot-4 senior averaged 31 points and six three-point shots in four games, including career-highs of 40 points and eight three-pointers Saturday in an 82-80 victory over Beverly Hills in the championship game.

“It was nice to have Steve break through,” Warren said. “We’re getting ideas, as games go on, of the things that will work and the things that won’t work to get him shots.”

Nothing appeared to work Dec. 7 when Morningside limited Clover to eight points and one three-pointer with an aggressive man-to-man defense.

Since then, Clover has not scored fewer than 19 in a game. Twice he has scored more than 30, helping Rolling Hills improve to 6-2.

“He just played better,” Warren said of Clover’s performance in the Beverly Hills Tournament, which earned him the Most Valuable Player award. “He’s getting stronger physically. That’s allowing him to get down court better. Plus, he’s mentally tough. He just keeps firing.”

Warren was also pleased with the play of 6-5 center Roger Hendrix and guard Chad Heitzler. The juniors were named all-tournament.

Hendrix, averaging 22 points and 10 rebounds, has helped fill the void left by John Hardy, Rolling Hills’ leading scorer and rebounder the previous two seasons.

“Roger just had a fabulous tournament,” Warren said. “He improves with every game. He’s rebounding better and he’s playing defense more like we want him to play. He’s the quickest post (player) I’ve seen.

“We played much more solid as a team. We’re getting more of an idea of what we’re trying to do. It’s always good when a young team wins because it gets some confidence.”

Rolling Hills will take a four-game winning streak into the Pepsi Classic in Seattle next week. The Titans open the 16-team tournament Tuesday against Lakeside High, one of the top teams in the state of Washington.

Clover, with 38 three-point shots, is on a pace to break Southern Section records for three-pointers in a season and career. He is second on the career list with 186 behind former Glendora star Tracy Murray. The UCLA freshman had 224 three-pointers and holds the season record with 125.

Clover drained 148 three-pointers in 29 games last season, the fourth-best mark since the shot was introduced to prep basketball in the 1987-88 season.

Rolling Hills, with 61 three-pointers, is also on a pace to break its team season record of 203 set in 1988-89.

One of the biggest turnarounds in a basketball team is being staged at North Torrance High.

The Saxons, who finished 4-16 and tied for

last place in the Ocean League with a 2-12 record last season, are off to a 4-4 start under third-year Coach Jim Nielsen.

“This team will win a lot more games,” Nielsen said. “If we had some rebounding, we could play with anybody.”

The high cost of housing in the South Bay cost North its best post player last summer when 6-4 sophomore Tom Baldwin moved with his family to Riverside County. Baldwin started as a freshman and would have been the team’s center.

That left the Saxons with a team whose tallest player is 6-3. But they’ve found success with a running game similar to that used by Loyola Marymount.

“We can shoot and run,” Nielsen said. “We can’t guard anybody right now, but we’re a fun team to watch.”

North has received solid play from a scrappy lineup of 6-3 junior center Shawn Roberts, forwards John Tymick (6-2) and Darren Sato (5-11) and guards Brian Jurado (5-10) and Mike Huang (5-6).

The Saxons posted wins over El Segundo and St. John Bosco last week in the El Segundo Tournament. Of their four losses, two were against a strong Quartz Hill team last week and two were by one point to Culver City and San Pedro in the Pacific Shores Tournament.

Nielsen is optimistic about the Ocean League season.

“With the exception of Morningside,” he said, “we can play with anybody in the league.”

With wins over Rolling Hills and Brea-Olinda, top-ranked Morningside has faced two teams expected to challenge the Monarchs for the Southern Section 3-AA Division basketball title.

In a preseason poll, Rolling Hills was ranked third and Brea-Olinda eighth in the division.

“I think we’re going to be better for it,” Co-Coach Carl Franklin said. “Brea is very similar to Rolling Hills in the way they implement the three-point shot. I think Rolling Hills has more structure, but intensity-wise they are both very similar.

“Now we have an idea of what to expect in a playoff situation.”

Morningside (7-1) unleashed a three-point shooter of its own in the fifth-place final of the Tournament of Champions at Ocean View High in Huntington Beach last week. Senior guard Martel Bland canned seven three-pointers and scored a game-high 24 points in a 69-58 win over Brea-Olinda.

Said Franklin: “I think he may end up being recruited the way he played that day.”

Talk about a tough week.

After beating West Covina in the first round of the Tournament of Champions last week, Westchester lost its last three games to Mater Dei, Morningside and Loyola.

Mater Dei, which lost in the championship game to Long Beach Poly, is rated No. 1 in the Southern Section 5-A Division, Morningside is No. 1 in 3-AA and Loyola No. 2 in 5-A.

Sometimes all it takes is one game to send a team into a tailspin.

El Segundo took a four-game winning streak into its second-round game against Bishop Montgomery in the El Segundo Tournament last week. But after leading by 16 points in the first half, the Eagles broke down in the second half and lost, 67-54.

El Segundo subsequently lost one-point games to North Torrance, 81-80, and Hawthorne, 82-81, to finish the tournament with a three-game skid.

“That (Bishop Montgomery) game was such a turnaround,” Eagle Coach Rick Sabosky said. “It hurt us, but I still think we’re capable of beating pretty good teams.”

El Segundo has also been hurt by the loss of starting forward Chris Hansen. The 6-4 junior is academically ineligible and will not be eligible for reinstatement until late in the Camino Real League season, Sabosky said.

The 22nd annual South Torrance boys soccer tournament will resume today with quarterfinal and semifinal games at South.

Defending tournament and Southern Section 4-A champion Palos Verdes will put its 39-game winning streak on the line at 10:30 a.m. against Mater Dei. The Sea Kings (6-0) set the Southern Section record for consecutive wins on Monday with a 2-1 victory over Culver City in the championship game of the South Bay Tournament.

In other quarterfinals, San Pedro faces Redondo and North Torrance meets Loyola in 9 a.m. games, while Damien faces San Marcos at 10:30. Semifinals will be played at 1:30 and 3 p.m. The title game is 3 p.m. Friday.

NOTES:Rolling Hills will play an alumni basketball game at 7 tonight in the school gym. Alumni expected to play include Doug Gehr, the 1987 Southern Section 3-A Player of the Year, and Mark Tesar, an All-CIF guard off last season’s team . . . Serra’s football team has been named the State Class AAA champion by Cal-Hi Sports after its 14-0 season that included the Southern Section Division VII title . . . The winner of this week’s L.A. Invitational basketball tournament at Long Beach City College and Banning High will play Manual Arts, the winner of last week’s half of the tournament at Cal State Los Angeles, either Dec. 29 or Jan. 3 at the Forum before a Laker game. It will be the first high school game ever played at the Forum . . . Derek Sparks, an All-L.A. City fullback at Banning High in 1988 who transferred last spring to Montclair Prep in Van Nuys, was named The Times San Fernando Valley Back of Year. The junior also earned All-Southern Section Division IX honors.