Boys' basketball: Westchester holds on

Boys’ basketball: Westchester holds on

Staff Writer

March 20, 2010 9:53 PM PT

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Mater Dei got to within one point midway through the fourth quarter before Westchester pulled away for a 71-63 victory in the Southern California Division I regional championship at the Galen Center.

Dwayne Polee Jr. had a moment to remember when he took an alley-oop pass from Denzel Douglas and slammed it home to give Westchester a seven-point lead with 2 minutes 29 seconds left. Polee was called for hanging on the rim, but Mater Dei’s Gary Franklin Jr. missed both free throws on the technical foul.

It was the first victory for Westchester Coach Ed Azzam against Mater Dei counterpart Gary McKnight after eight losses.

--Ben Bolch

Varsity Times Insider

Ben Bolch

Ben Bolch has been a Los Angeles Times staff writer since 1999. He is serving his second stint as the UCLA beat writer, which seems fitting since he has covered almost every sports beat except hockey and horse racing. Bolch is also the author of the recently released book “100 Things UCLA Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die.” He previously covered UCLA basketball from 2010-11 before going on to cover the NBA and the Clippers for five years. He happily traded in gobs of hotel points and airline miles to return to cover UCLA basketball and football in the summer of 2016. Bolch was once selected by NBA TV’s “The Starters” as the “Worst of the Week” after questioning their celebrity journalism-style questions at an NBA All-Star game and considers it one of his finer moments.