Thriller goes wrong way

LAGUNA BEACH “” Laguna Beach High senior forward Alex Masukawa seemed set, ready to take a big charge as JSerra’s Trenton Coggins crashed into him late in the fourth quarter of Wednesday night’s CIF Southern Section Division IV-A playoff game.

The charge would have given the Breakers the ball, up by two with 33 seconds left.

But the charge never happened.

The referee called a blocking foul, part of a three-point play that gave JSerra a one-point lead. The Lions went on for a 68-61 overtime victory, ending the Breakers’ season.

“The charge/block call was a big turning point,” Laguna Beach Coach Bret Fleming said.

“We’ve been asking our guys all year long to slide across and take the charge. I thought Alex did a great job of that The bottom line is that we just ran out of bodies.”

The blocking call was just one of several frustrating calls for the Breakers’ faithful, who saw Masukawa, sophomore forward Derek Reigel and sophomore point guard Tyler Masukawa all foul out by the end of the game.

Coggins, a junior guard, scored 43 for JSerra (12-15), an at-large team from the powerful Trinity League. Still, it looked for a second like Laguna freshman center Jake Dalke might be the hero.

Dalke’s three-pointer from the corner with eight seconds left in regulation forced overtime, after Coggins’ subsequent floater in the lane came up short.

But the crippled Orange Coast League champions (10-14) were outscored, 13-6, in the four-minute extra session.

JSerra took a 3-2 lead early in the game. After that, the Breakers led until Coggins’ drive to the basket with 5:30 left in the fourth quarter.

Senior guard Adam Selevan poured in a team-high 24 points for Laguna. Dalke had 13, Reigel had eight and Alex Masukawa added six.

The Breakers were also hit with about a dozen traveling calls over the course of the game.

“What are you going to do?” Fleming said. “That’s the way they were calling it, and you’ve got to adjust. I don’t think we adjusted to it.”

Still, while the loss may hurt now, the Breakers will be able to reflect back on this year. Few expected them to win their fourth straight league title, but that’s exactly what the young team did.

As they did against a bigger JSerra team, the Laguna kids battled, Fleming said.

“I don’t think people expected us to be able to play with [JSerra],” Fleming said.

“I asked the kids after the game who was the better team, and the kids agreed that they thought we were. Things didn’t fall our way, but I think the returning kids are going to grow from that. I just feel bad for the seniors that it ended maybe a little too early.”