Ailing Hernandez Still Leads Sonora’s Balanced Offense

This may be the best Sonora boys’ basketball team Mike Murphy has put together. But the Raiders also have learned that reputation means nothing unless you back it up.

That’s why Murphy was ecstatic about Friday’s 66-56 victory over Los Alamitos. It was more than the county’s fifth-ranked team beating No. 7; to Murphy’s thinking, it was beating the kind of quality opponent Sonora will see in the playoffs.

“We need to beat teams like this,” Murphy said. “They have a great program. I told the kids before the game ‘I’m not going to outcoach (the Griffins’) Steve Brooks, who’s forgotten more basketball than I’ll ever know, so you’re going to have to outplay them.’ ”

It took Sonora (9-2) more than a half to gain control of Los Alamitos (8-3). Trailing, 37-32, with five minutes to go in the third quarter, the Raiders went on a 28-14 run to go up by nine with less than three minutes to play.

They did it by spreading around the offense. Sergio Hernandez, who was doubtful before the game because of stomach sickness and who felt lightheaded at halftime, still managed 18 points; Chad Fister had 17 points; Josh Lein scored 13 in the second half, and Craig Clark contributed 16 points and 10 rebounds.

“I keep telling people about Sergie and how good he is,” Murphy said. “And Lein is only a sophomore, but he is really coming on.”

Sonora also was tough on defense, forcing seven of the Griffins’ 12 turnovers in the second half. The seven-foot Clark had three blocked shots but affected several others.

Forward Cory Johnson led all scorers with 19 points. Forward Jeremy Vandervoet had 17, 14 in the first half; Vandervoet made only one of four shots in the second half, and that came with about 10 seconds left in the game.

“We had about seven possessions where we didn’t score,” Brooks said. “Partially it was their defense and partially because we didn’t execute our offense. Jeremy is a big part of our offense and we have to get the ball to him. They also changed their defense on him in the second half, but we didn’t get the job done.”