THE HIGH SCHOOLS / STEVE ELLING : Buena Knows It Has a Prayer as Long as Fay Takes Final Shot

The hands of many Buena High supporters were clasped, to be sure, but a prayer is in the eye of the beholder.

When Lance Fay banked in a running, 18-foot jump shot with three seconds left in a Southern Section Division I-A quarterfinal game at Ventura College on Friday night, players and coaches on the Pasadena bench might have been thinking that the basketball gods had conspired against them.

Others weren’t so sure.

“If I hadn’t seen him make so many of those in the past I’d say it was a prayer,” said Judy Hannah, wife of Buena Coach Glen Hannah. “From my angle it was a blur.”

There was nothing hazy about the outcome. Fay’s basket saved the day for Buena, 64-63, and perhaps saved miles of wear and tear on the sneakers of teammate Nick Houchin, who was facing extra laps.

Glen Hannah thought he had covered all the angles in the final minute. Pasadena scored from 15 feet with eight seconds remaining to take a 63-62 lead, and Hannah had given explicit orders: His players were to inbound the ball before the defense could set up and clear out so that Fay could drive or pass the ball to the perimeter.

No sooner did Pasadena’s shot fall through the hoop than a whistle sounded. Who called for a timeout? An official pointed toward Houchin, who insisted he was innocent. Nobody seemed to know, and Hannah since has received conflicting reports from fans.

Said an official to Hannah: “I’m pretty sure (Houchin) called time. You can trust my partner.”

Cracked Hannah: “Hey, I saw you work this game. I don’t trust either of you.”

After the huddle, Buena (23-4) inbounded the ball to Fay, who sliced through a double-team and scored from the top of the key.

Just another routine, game-winning shot. This was hardly the first time that Fay had bailed out Buena in the final seconds. He twice doomed Channel League rival San Marcos in the final seconds with buzzer-beaters.

Some folks are getting jaded, in fact. If this heroism stuff were an Olympic event, Fay would need to upgrade the degree of difficulty.

“Blindfolded would be something,” Glen Hannah said.

The Bulldogs might need a blindfold and a cigarette Tuesday when they play top-seeded Mater Dei (29-1) in the semifinals at 7:30 p.m. at Ocean View High. Mater Dei is the state’s top-ranked team.

Little guys stand tall: A few dozen yards separate the Playa del Rey campuses of Westchester and St. Bernard highs, where two teams from the region Friday night took on top-seeded teams in the playoffs.

The results were polar opposites.

Taft was hammered by host Westchester, 76-62, in the City Section 4-A Division quarterfinals. Just across a back alley, though, L.A. Baptist was in the process of upsetting top-seeded Verbum Dei, 50-49, in the Southern Section Division IV-A quarterfinals at St. Bernard.

In short, it was a night for small schools to shine. Of the eight area schools still alive in the Southern Section boys’ playoffs, six compete at the III-A level or below.

And if there weren’t enough twos in basketball to begin with, teams from the same league seem to be pairing off. Channel League members Buena (Division I-A) and Rio Mesa (II-AA) lived to play another day. Ditto Frontier League entries Santa Paula (III-A) and Santa Clara (IV-AA), and Delphic rivals Faith Baptist (V-AA) and Campbell Hall (V-AA).

Unofficial kings of the small-school survivors are teams from the Delphic. Five of the seven teams in the league are still alive in the semifinals, and in Division V-AA, three of the four semifinalists are Delphic teams.

League members Faith Baptist and Brentwood--the defending Division V-AA champion--will play Tuesday.

Doing the splits: The City Section is studying the possibility of dividing conferences into 3-A and 4-A leagues in boys’ and girls’ basketball and girls’ volleyball.

Under the plan, four teams would play in each league and leagues would be adjusted annually based on teams’ conference records. One league would compete in the 3-A and the other in 4-A.

The format was adopted last fall for football, and City Commissioner Hal Harkness sees the plan as a way of making the divisions more equitable. In boys’ basketball, for instance, only 16 of the more than 50 teams compete at the 4-A level, and all automatically qualify for the playoffs.

Barring significant opposition, Harkness said, the plan could be in place by next season.