FULLERTON — The stakes were high in Friday’s game between North Hills League boys basketball foes Sunny Hills and Pacifica. The winner would get a chance to play for the league title next week while the loser would have to settle for a second- or third-place finish.
The Lancers defeated the Mariners 47-34 to set up a showdown with Esperanza for the outright league championship.
Esperanza (17-8, 5-2) will be the home team against Sunny Hills (18-9, 5-2) in the league finale Tuesday night.
Sunny Hills coach Joe Ok acknowledged the terrific atmosphere in the Lancers gym and showed gratitude for the opportunity to win league while earning a playoff berth.
“This was a situation for us where we could punch a ticket to the playoffs and not only that, get the opportunity to play for a league championship on Tuesday,” Ok said.
Senior forward ZeBrien Watkins scored a game-high 17 points, eight of those in the pivotal third quarter.
“Ze’s been our leader all year long,” Ok said, “and these are the moments where we’ve talked about stepping up, as a senior, in big moments like this, and today he showed up.”
Watkins added a thunderous slam dunk in transition with a great pass from Jayden Bai after a couple of missed free throws by Pacifica to start the fourth quarter.
Kamron Tonga (eight points) collected the rebound from the missed free throw to start that sequence.
“We just came with more energy (in the second half),” Watkins said. “We knew we needed it, so all of us came together and made it happen.”
Pacifica coach David Friedman was pleased with his team’s intensity on defense but pointed out that the team has to to make more shots in order to win.
“I thought our kids battled tonight,” Friedman said. “Shots didn’t go our way tonight but I thought defensively our game plan and execution of the game plan was solid.”
Maxon Tjhatra scored a team-high 13 points for the Mariners (18-9, 4-3)
“It’s a tight race as the standings show, three teams tied for first going into the final two games,” Friedman said. “And now we’re at Brea Tuesday, and that’s win and get in (to the playoffs).”
Both teams struggled to score much in the first half Friday, but Ok believes his team settled down in the second quarter.
“I think our guys were amped up, it was Senior Night,” Ok said, “but once the nerves calmed down and we started getting into form we were able to establish ourselves and get what we wanted.”
Senior guard Raeden Bobadilla scored nine of his 11 points in the second quarter, taking advantage of pockets of space from beyond the arc in Pacifca’s zone defense while giving Sunny Hills a 10-point halftime lead.
“For him, against the zone, he’s a shooter for us, inside-outside.” Ok said about Bobadilla, “but tonight it was more from the outside. If you leave him open he can knock down shots and his 3s were big for us, to give us a little momentum going into the second half.”
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