Pierce Is Starting to Get His Points Across : Summer Games: Junior is making it clear that he will be Inglewood’s go-to guy this season.

Inglewood High Coach Patrick Roy remembers some stellar basketball players that have come out of school the past decade.

Roy was a member of the Sentinels’ Southern Section 4-A Division finalist team as a sophomore in 1982.

As an eighth grader, the second-year coach was a frequent spectator at Inglewood games during the 1980 season as a Jay Humphries and Ralph Jackson-led team won the 4-A title and a mythical national championship.

Humphries, who has played for three seasons with the Phoenix Suns and five seasons with the Milwaukee Bucks, recently completed his first season with the Jazz. Jackson, the 1980 4-A player of the year, competed at UCLA and played a season for the Indiana Pacers.

Roy was an assistant in Harold Miner’s senior season at Inglewood in 1989. Miner, USC’s all-time leading scorer, recently completed his rookie season with the Heat.

Sam Turks, the 1992 Bay League most valuable player, is among this season’s returning players from a Sentinel team that reached the Division II-AA semifinals.

So where does that leave Paul Pierce, a 6-foot-5 junior who struggled to make the varsity last season?

“Right now, he could be just as good as Harold Miner,” Roy said about the 205-pound Pierce. “Harold had more athletic ability and could do some phenomenal things. But (Pierce) is a more complete and well-rounded fundamental player at this stage.”

Pierce demonstrated such promise Saturday in the L.A. Watts Summer Games.

Pierce scored 18 points and had 14 rebounds in a 60-49 quarterfinal loss to Manual Arts at Inglewood High.

Pierce, who had four blocks, scored the Sentinels first five points of the second half as Inglewood rallied from an 11-point deficit to close to 52-49 on consecutive three-point baskets by Turks with less than a minute to play.

In a 65-54 victory over Washington earlier Saturday, Pierce had 21 points and 16 rebounds to propel the Sentinels into the quarterfinals of the 128-team tournament.

There was a time early last season when Pierce would be hard-pressed to get any playing time.

“It was almost to the point I was going to drop down to junior varsity,” Pierce said. “I didn’t think they would give me a chance.”

Pierce finally got his chance in December.

Starting center Damon Brisco was forced to miss several games after his brother Andre, 12, died after suffering a severe asthma attack.

Backup Ralph Shelton was disciplined because of missed practices and Shannon Brown left to visit relatives on the East Coast during Christmas vacation.

“I thought it was just temporary, but I stayed in the lineup and I think I’ve gotten better playing against competition,” Pierce said.

Given the opportunity, Pierce has been a starter since. Inglewood (20-10) stumbled to a 4-6 start, but won 15 of its last 17 games en route to its second Bay League title in three seasons.

With Pierce, Turks (6-0), Shelton (6-5) and the addition of seniors Jason Crowe (6-2) and David Lewis (6-4), Inglewood has hopes of winning its first Southern Section championship in 14 seasons.

“Right now, we’re playing better as a team,” Pierce said. “Most of us have played together before and in terms of work ethic, we’re all working a lot harder.”

Pierce’s play last season earned him second-team All-Bay League honors. He is the only underclassman on the California Seniors, a traveling team whose members include Turks, Cameron Murray of Glendora and Loyola’s Toby Bailey.

“I would have never thought about putting him in, but we had nobody left,” Roy said. “It was my fault as a new coach and my mistake for not having the right person in there. We just couldn’t win and everything just flip-flopped after he came in. Finding Paul was like finding a gold mine.”