SUNSET LEAGUE ROUNDUP : Huntington Beach Stuns Edison
Clutch free-throw shooting and point guard Tommy Walden’s solid play helped Huntington Beach earn a 62-56 victory over Edison Friday night in the Sunset League finale for both teams.
Huntington Beach made 12 of 18 free throws in the last quarter to hold off an Edison rally with Walden getting the key shots. Walden, who finished with 18 points and eight assists, made nine of 12 free throws in the fourth quarter.
Edison’s loss, coupled with Marina’s 84-57 victory over Santa Ana, left the two teams tied for the league title. Edison finished the regular season 16-8, 9-3; Marina is 17-9, 9-3.
Huntington Beach (15-10, 8-4) also was expected to contend for the league title but inconsistency hurt its title chances.
“This is the way you’d like to start and end the season,” Huntington Beach Coach Roy Miller said. “To a degree, the season was a disappointment. But we’ve been playing good, consistent basketball for the past two weeks and we’re hoping for a strong showing in the (Southern Section) playoffs.”
Huntington Beach will enter postseason play next week with plenty of momentum following a strong showing against Edison. Center Jeff Vanderwal and forward Matt Ambrose complemented Walden’s play with strong inside games.
Vanderwal finished with 16 points and 11 rebounds and Ambrose came off the bench in the second quarter to score 10 of his 12 points to give Huntington Beach a 28-25 lead at halftime.
“Ambrose played his best game since he’s been at Huntington Beach High and Vanderwal was strong on the boards,” Miller said. “I also thought (Tony) Gonzalez made Brandon Jessie work for his points.”
Jessie led all scorers with 27 points, including a half-court shot at the buzzer to end the first half. Jessie also showed that he has been working on the three-point shot, making three of six attempts.
But despite Jessie’s fine play, Edison was trailing, 46-34, with 1:15 remaining in the third quarter before rallying early in the fourth quarter. Edison managed to trim Huntington Beach’s lead to three points, 49-46, when Ken Eatherton made a three-point shot and later got to within four points, 57-53, when Josh Serafin scored on a follow shot with 34 seconds remaining.
Afterward, Edison Coach Jon Borchert was satisfied with his team’s effort, but disappointed that his team couldn’t complete the fourth quarter comeback.
“We couldn’t get over the hump,” Borchert said. “When we had to, we couldn’t make it happen. I thought we played really hard, it just wasn’t one of our better games.”
In other league games:
Marina 84, Santa Ana 57--Darren Crooks scored 22 as the Vikings (17-9, 9-3) earned a share of the their third consecutive league title and their second in a row with Edison. Gus Garcia had 16 points and seven rebounds for Santa Ana.
Ocean View 79, Fountain Valley 69--Jim Harris scored 12 of his 23 points in the fourth quarter to lead an Ocean View rally. The Seahawks (16-9, 8-4) scored 32 points in the fourth quarter after trailing, 49-47, after three quarters. Bryan Knox scored 14 points for Ocean View, including eight in the fourth quarter.