FREEWAY LEAGUE : St. Clair Sets Mark in Sonora Victory
Sonora senior guard Chris St. Clair broke the school career scoring record with a layup in the second quarter. But his big night was almost ruined when visiting Sonora nearly blew a 13-point third-quarter lead before hanging on for a 55-52 victory over La Habra Wednesday night.
St. Clair, who finished with a game-high 22 points, sank two free throws with 15 seconds left to give Sonora a 55-52 lead. The points were Sonora’s first since the 3:20 mark when St. Clair hit a hanging jumper in the lane to give the seventh-ranked Raiders (16-3, 4-0) a 53-46 lead.
La Habra (7-10, 2-2) had two chances to tie, but Rusty Volker and Ken Cauley’s three-point shots hit the rim and bounced off in the last 10 seconds.
Sonora gave La Habra hope when it missed three front ends of one-and-one situations and had two turnovers in the last two minutes. The Highlanders capitalized when Cauley hit two free throws, Andrija Kristich (18 points) made a layup and Ed Glover (17 points) hit his third turnaround jumper of the quarter, trimming the lead to 53-52.
But then St. Clair was fouled; he swished two free throws.
After being held scoreless in the first quarter, St. Clair hit a pull-up jumper and then converted two steals into layups--the second broke Eric Samuelson’s record of 1,319 points with 3:53 left in the half.
“It’s something I’ve been working for since the seventh grade,” St. Clair said.
Sonora Coach Mike Murphy had the game stopped and announced St. Clair’s feat over the visitor’s public address system.
“Maybe he had that on his mind,” Murphy said. “If I had it to do over, I’d probably ignore it.”
In other league games:
Fullerton 64, Buena Park 63--Chris Young scored his only basket of the game with six seconds left, hitting the game-winning shot, a baseline 10-footer, for Fullerton (11-8, 2-2). Chad Murray led Fullerton with 20 points. Alex Tolentino had 25 points for Buena Park (9-9, 2-2).
Troy 67, Sunny Hills 47--Mark Stenner had 27 points and Greg Abbott 15 points and nine rebounds to lead Troy (8-10, 1-3). Mario Bertaul had 18 points for Sunny Hills (6-11, 1-3).