Attitude Adjustment Gets Mater Dei Past Antelope Valley

Early in the third quarter Tuesday night, Mater Dei was trailing Antelope Valley in their Division I-A boys’ basketball semifinal. Monarch guard Anthony Valles passed by his bench and got a blast from Coach Gary McKnight.

This wasn’t just any ordinary dressing down. McKnight’s already reddened face looked more like a beet.

Valles was allowing Antelope Valley players to beat him to the boards for offensive rebounds and McKnight wanted it to stop.

Valles got the message.

His rebound and basket with 4 minutes 40 seconds left got the Monarchs even. His two rebounds and two steals over the next several minutes were key elements in an 11-2 run that helped Mater Dei defeat Antelope Valley, 70-49, at Ocean View High.

Mike Vukovich led all scorers with 24 points and a season-high 20 rebounds. Mater Dei (29-2) advances to a Southern Section final for the sixth consecutive season. Kevin Augustine ignored a sore right shoulder and a stiff left knee and had 12 points, including several key drives for baskets in the final quarter.

Antelope Valley center Le’Tre Kelly followed up his 49-point, 27-rebound performance in two playoff games last week by leading the Antelopes (23-7) with 17 points. But Kelly had foul trouble much of the second half. He made only six of 19 shots and was 0 for 5 from three-point range.

Valles, who has scored in double figures only four times this season, had seven points. But his basket to tie the score at 32-32 with 4:40 left in the third quarter set the tone for what was to come.

“He got some big steals down the stretch and a big basket,” Augustine said of Valles.

Said Valles: “Coach got in my face. It fired me up. Did it have a factor in the game? Might not. But he really got on my case.”

Antelope Valley Coach Tom Mahan tinkered with his zone-trapping defense and threw a 1-3-1 zone at Mater Dei to open the game, the first time this season he has used it.

The tactic worked. With Augustine pushed out to the No. 2 guard spot because he is not fully recovered from his injuries, the Monarchs had only two options: force the ball inside to Vukovich, or try three-pointers. They did a better job of getting the ball to Vukovich, who had 10 points and nine rebounds in the first half. But they were horrible from three-point range, making only one of 12.

“We were only going to stay in that zone for four or five minutes,” Mahan said. “But we went with it the entire half.”

Augustine said the Monarchs decided to junk the three-point shot in the second half. They attempted three more three-pointers and outscored the Antelopes, 20-8, in the third quarter, mostly on mid-range shots or rebound baskets.