Antelope Valley Slips Past Second Round

Good riddance. The big bad streak is over.

Antelope Valley College finally made it past the second round of the men’s Southern California Regional with a 77-72 basketball victory Wednesday night over Mt. San Antonio at home.

The Marauders (26-6) had never reached the third round of the playoffs but they made it this time and will travel to Santa Monica on Saturday for the right to play at the final eight tournament in San Jose on March 7-9.

Santa Monica dropped Long Beach City, 87-72, on Wednesday.

The Marauders, seeded sixth in the regional, were challenged until the final seconds by Mt. San Antonio (16-15), which did not go gently into the freezing night.

Antelope Valley led, 60-53, with 10 minutes 1 second left but fell behind, 68-64, about five minutes later and the outcome wasn’t decided until Brian Burleson made a layup with four seconds remaining for the last points of the game.

“When we went from seven up to four down, I said, ‘Lord, have mercy,’ ” said Newton Chelette, Antelope Valley coach. A trio of Mountie guards, Leon Washington (17 points), Eddie Powell (14) and Toriano Holt (12), put pressure on the Antelope Valley defense with excellent outside shooting.

But the Marauders stepped it up on defense and rallied just in time.

Guard Ty Gaines (nine points) tied the score, 70-70, with 2:31 to go on a layup after stealing a pass and point guard Jerome Payton did likewise with 52 seconds left to increase the Marauder advantage to 74-70.

Jamar Bailey, Mt. Sac’s 6-foot-6 freshman center, had only nine points and five rebounds. He went into the game averaging 16 points and 8.4 rebounds, both tops on the team.

The Marauders got another stellar performance from Payton, who finished with 17 points and five assists.

The sophomore from Palmdale High had paced Antelope Valley in scoring 23 times and went into the game averaging a team-high 18.8 points.

Burleson finished with 14 points for the Marauders and Mike Salser added 12 points. Guard Brandon McIntire, normally a starter who averages 12.7 points, saw limited action because of a sprained ankle and scored three points.

Ventura 96, Trade Tech 73--Shannon Taylor scored 23 points and Charles Woodard added 15 points as the Pirates won a second-round Southern California Regional game at Ventura.

The victory sends Ventura (30-2) on to the regional final game against Chaffey at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Ventura.

Riverside 94, Valley 82--LaMarr Thompson scored 26 points and Michael Farmer scored 11 for Valley (23-11) in a second-round Southern California Regional at Riverside.