Tritons silence Sea Kings

Bryce Alderton

Even before tipoff, Corona del Mar High boys basketball coach Ryan

Curry knew his team faced a tough test in the quarterfinals of the

Estancia Coast Classic.

You can also add the adjective “tall” to that description as the

San Clemente, the designated visiting team, overpowered the Sea Kings

on the boards and on the scoreboard to the tune of a 53-35 victory

Saturday.

San Clemente, which included 6-foot-9 starting sophomore center

Taylor Harrison, outrebounded the Sea Kings, 42-20, causing Curry

angst.

“If the kids are tall, there is no reason you can’t put a body on

someone and make someone shoot over the top,” Curry said. “We have to

rebound in order to run transition.”

The Sea Kings (6-6) were forced to play catch up after San

Clemente burst to a 10-1 lead the first four minutes, 57 seconds of

the game.

CdM missed its first 11 field-goal attempts before senior guard

Adam Freede scored two of his six points with a layup to trim the

lead to 10-3.

Senior guard Jay Northridge led CdM with 10 points while Pancho

Seaborn was held to eight points. Freede, who tallied six assists,

and Northridge each had five steals, contributing to 10 of San

Clemente’s 22 total turnovers. CdM had nine turnovers.

Thirteen first-half turnovers allowed CdM, which never led, to

slowly creep to within 20-17 by halftime.

Freede found junior Kevin Welch under the hoop for a layup to trim

the San Clemente lead to 28-26 with 3:18 left in the third quarter.

But CdM would get no closer as San Clemente went on a 7-0 run to

close out the period, sparked by five points from senior forward

Andrew Williams.

“We missed a layup, they hit a three and we missed another layup,”

Curry said about the sequence of events after the 28-26 deficit.

“Before you knew it, we had spent way too much energy. Every time we

needed a stop or a bucket, we could not get it.”

Freshman Landon Pluimer led San Clemente with 12 points, including

three three-pointers, while Harrison tallied 10 points and seven

rebounds.

The Tritons (6-6) drained five threes while Northridge tallied

CdM’s lone three ball, the first time the Sea Kings have been held to

one trey since their third game of the season.

“We weren’t content to go all the way [with the set offense],”

Curry said. “We shot way too early. You would like to make the

defense work harder and harder with running the passing game. [The

Tritons] forced us to get out of that.”

“We knew we had to stop Seaborn,” San Clemente Coach Shawn

Mulligan said. Seaborn had averaged 26.4 points in his last five

games. “Some of the other guys changed their defensive pressure and

did a good job adjusting to other guys. But CdM is a scrappy team.

They played tough against us. It wasn’t a pretty game, but we’ll take

it.”

Welch scored four points while Reid Watanabe and Brian Reynolds

each added two points for CdM, which returns to action at 3:15 p.m.

Monday against the Foothill Knights.

The Sea Kings came into Saturday’s game having won four

consecutive tournament games dating to last year, when they won the

consolation championship.

*--*

Estancia Coast Classic Quarterfinal

San Clemente 53, Corona del Mar 35

Score by Quarters

San Clemente 13 7 15 18 -- 53

CdM 5 12 9 9 -- 35

San Clemente -- Pluimer 12, Willsey 6,

Harrison 10, Wood 2, Maley 9, Williams 7,

Wodiske 5, Roberts 2, Ruskinovich 0, Ochoa 0,

Mimms 0. 3-pt. goals -- Pluimer 3, Wodiske 1,

Williams 1. Corona del Mar -- Seaborn 8, T.

Lance 1, R. Lance 2, Freede 6, Northridge 10,

K. Welch 4, Watanabe 2, Reynolds 2, McDonald

0, Kabaklian 0, T. Welch 0. 3-pt. goals --

Northridge 1.

*--*