Boys basketball: Eagles come up short

Tony Altobelli

IRVINE - After three mandatory wins in a row, a fourth just wasn’t

in the cards for the Estancia High boys basketball team.

University came out blazing early and took care of the visiting

Eagles, 79-60, to share the Pacific Coast League championship with Costa

Mesa.

After wins over Laguna Beach, Corona del Mar and Northwood, Thursday

night’s loss eliminated Estancia (10-15, 5-5 in league) from playoff

consideration, but according to Coach Chris Sorce, the Eagles have

nothing to be ashamed of.

“I wouldn’t trade this team for any team in the world,” an emotional

Sorce said afterward. “These are great kids and they proved to everyone

that they can play with anybody out there. We just ran into a buzz saw

tonight.

That Trojans’ buzz saw was the combination of Jason Garey and Hiro

Christoph. Garey led Uni (15-10, 7-3) with 24 points and four rebounds,

while Christoph added 14 points and five rebounds.

“They were on fire early and Uni is a hard team to come back against,”

Sorce said. “We had a poor start and never recovered from it.”

Senior Eliasar Maldonado led the Eagles with 20 points, while junior

Micah Young added 18 points and 14 rebounds.

“We tried to throw every offensive play in the book at them tonight,

but we just couldn’t find the right combination,” Sorce said. “We didn’t

play all that poorly. University simply played better and won.”

Estancia’s first and last lead came at 4-3, following two Young free

throws. The Trojans ended the first quarter on a 19-8 run and led, 22-12.

From there, it was all Uni. A 9-4 run pushed the lead to 15. Estancia

cut it to 12 before the Trojans ended the first half with a 9-0 run and

led by 21.

“We definitely came out better than the last time we played them (a

73-65 Estancia win on Jan. 24),” Uni Coach Mike Dinneen said. “I felt

that we did a better job of containing Young, who had 39 points against

us last time.”

Maldonado and Young helped the Eagles get as close as 15, but the

Trojans never let them get any closer.

Estancia managed to outscore the Trojans, 35-33, in the second half,

but it was too little, too late. The loss snapped the Eagles’ 13-year

playoff run, but that was of little significance to Sorce.

“These kids played the game in a positive way,” he said. “They showed

great responsibility on the floor and they became better individuals and

teammates as the season wore on. I’d rather finish every year 10-15 and

coach great kids then play better with bad kids.”

In addition to Christoph and Garey, the Trojans also received quality

offensive production from David Feistel (13 points), Greg Asnon (11

points) and Andre Newsome (10 points).

Young, Rodriguez and George Prado will be the only returning lettermen

for the Eagles next year. “Some of these players played their last game

of competitive basketball, which is kind of sad to see,” Sorce said.

“We’ve got seven seniors leaving and it’s going to be hard to replace

them. But we’ll be back in it next year.”

PACIFIC COAST LEAGUE BOYS

University 79, Estancia 60

Score by Quarters

Estancia 12 13 13 22 - 60

University 22 24 11 22 - 79

Estancia - Maldonado 20, Young 18, K. Valbuena 9, Rodriguez 8, D.

Valbuena 5, Cachola 0, Berame 0, Niles 0, Prado 0.

3-pt. goals - Maldonado 2.

Fouled out - Cachola, Prado.

Technicals - none.

University - Garey 24, Christoph 14, Feistel 13, Asnon 11, Newsome 10,

Gomez 5, Tran 2.

3-pt. goals - Garey 4, Christoph 2, Asnon 1, Gomez 1.

Fouled out - none.

Technicals - none.