Carson Brown played great for Tesoro’s boys basketball team on CIF Southern Section Championship Saturday.
Zack Davidson was outstanding, too, for Mater Deo.
Sage Hill’s Carter Bryant had another exceptional game.
Tesoro senior Jake Bennett’s play and postgame comments provided a reminder about what it takes to win a CIF basketball championship.
“It’s a team sport,” Bennett said.
Brown scored 27 points, half of his team’s total, in the Titans’ 54-35 win over Orange Lutheran in the CIF-SS Division 2AA championship game Saturday night at Edison High.
Bennett scored 13 points with eight rebounds.
Nathan Draper gave his team an emotional lift by making a buzzer-beating bank shot at the end of the third quarter, and he made a crucial 3-pointer in the fourth quarter. Draper also had seven rebounds and Blake Manning had four assists.
Davidson scored 27 points with 11 rebounds to lead the Monarchs to a 66-53 win over Etiwanda in the Division 1 final at Honda Center. The Monarchs don’t win that game without their two freshmen, Luke Barnett and Brannon Martinsen, doing their part. Barnett scored 12 points and Martinsen scored nine points with five rebounds.
Bryant did what was expected of him. He scored 22 points with 16 rebounds and four steals.
He needed more support, though, and Sage Hill could not match Long Beach Jordan’s offensive versatility, and the Lightning lost 68-57 in the Division 4A final.
Jordan had three players score 14 or more points.
Bryant, Brown and Davidson played like the All-Orange County first-team selections. Brown and Davidson improved their candidacies for Orange County player of the year. Those two and Canyon sophomore Brandon Benjamin are the three finalists for the honor.
All have been great players this season. As great as they have been, Saturday proved again that, like Bennett said, basketball is and always will be a team game.
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