SPORTS WATCH : Hoop Dreams

For most of the last 30 years the Los Angeles Unified School District has held its high school championship basketball games at the Sports Arena. Imagine playing basketball where the National Basketball Assn. holds court. It’s the stuff of hoop dreams.

This year, however, the Sports Arena is out because of the high cost of renting the 15,000-seat facility. So to the disappointment of players, and fans, the games will be held at Cal State Dominguez Hills, beginning Friday.

The campus facility is considerably less expensive (ticket prices will be the same as last year, $5 general admission), but the alternative site just isn’t the Sports Arena. First of all, the teams and family members and other fans will have to trek to the Dominguez Hills campus, which, unlike the Sports Arena, is not centrally situated. The capacity at the campus is only 4,500, so fans are expected to be turned away.

Until three years ago the LAUSD could afford the Sports Arena for its city section basketball games of the California Interscholastic Federation. But in 1992 the cost of renting the arena rose a whopping $17,000--to $43,000--because of increased security needs, and the LAUSD lost $27,000 on the games over the last two years. (The southern section of the federation will hold its boys championship games at The Pond, owned by Anaheim, on Saturday for less than $40,000.)

We hope the LAUSD--now trying to find sponsors for the 1996 championship--can return to the Sports Arena. Might the games be played “piggyback” with Clippers games in order to bring high school hoops back to the favored site?