Antelope Valley Defense Collars Glendale, 93-72

One coach limped in, but it was the opposing team that hobbled out Saturday night at Antelope Valley College.

Marauder men’s basketball Coach Newton Chelette, who sustained strained knee ligaments officiating a college game a few days earlier, walked gingerly on the sidelines.

Visiting Glendale, ultimately, was the one with the painful look as Antelope Valley pounded the Vaqueros, 93-72, in a first-round game of the Southern California regionals in Marauder Gym.

Antelope Valley, winner of its last nine games, moved to a second-round game Wednesday against Riverside (25-9), which beat Santa Barbara, 83-75, on Saturday.

“They got too many pistolas ,” Glendale Coach Brian Beauchemin said. “They gave us opportunities but we didn’t make it a nutcracker.”

The main guns for the Marauders (24-8) were forward John Puckett with a game-high 25 points and 6-foot-11 center Mario Garcia with 15.

But, Chelette said, the Marauders won the game not on their superior height but because of their harassing man-to-man defense that forced 16 turnovers by Glendale (16-15).

“I don’t think that our size advantage had much to do with it,” Chelette said. “What won the game was the defensive job by our players to go out and guard their three-point shooters.”

Antelope Valley limited the Vaqueros to six three-pointers in 23 attempts. Glendale had made 37.2% (212 of 570) of its three-point attempts.

With the Glendale outside shooting misfiring, Antelope Valley concentrated on the inside game to turn a 47-36 lead at the half into a rout.

Glendale cut the Marauder lead to 50-46 with 15 minutes 52 seconds to play on a basket by forward Jim Evans and a baseline jumper by guard Kenny Collins.

But that was as close as the Vaqueros got.

Antelope Valley went on an 11-2 run to extend its lead to 61-48 with 11:53 remaining and had an 18-point cushion (76-58), its biggest of the night, on consecutive dunks by forward Marcus Cross and center Darnell Cherry with 6:09 left.

Antelope Valley wrapped the scoring with 10 free throws in a row after Glendale had closed the gap to 83-72 with less than two minutes to play.

“Going in, our plan was, we shoot well and take care of the basketball, it would be a close game,” Beauchemin said.

Glendale did neither, shooting only 32.4% from the field. Antelope Valley shot 39.7%.

Nick Athanassakis led Glendale with 16 points and guard Will Burr, making a rare start, had 15 points. Athanassakis also had nine rebounds. Marauder sophomore point guard Brian Willcox set a school single-season assist record with 213. He broke the previous mark of 210 set in 1990 by Dedan Thomas, who starred at Taft High.