Prep Tournament of Champions : Ocean View Beats Scrappy Santa Clara

The Tournament of Champions, a positive indicator for the Santa Clara High School basketball team in the past, has once again left the Saints happy in defeat.

In 1984, the Saints raised plenty of eyebrows by taking Santa Ana Mater Dei into overtime in the semifinals before losing. Later, Santa Clara won the Southern Section 2-A title. Friday night, Lou Cvijanovich brought another of his short but typically scrappy teams down from Oxnard and gave undefeated Huntington Beach Ocean View, The Times’ sixth-ranked team, all it could handle before falling, 56-52, at Cal Poly Pomona.

The Seahawks will meet Compton Dominguez in tonight’s title game.

“I knew all along,” Cvijanovich said afterward. “We’re tougher than hell.”

Santa Clara (6-2) certainly looked the part in the fourth quarter, when it came back from a 10-point, third-quarter deficit to climb within one, 43-42, with 5:04 left on Dan Jones’ jumper. Ocean View took control from there, using a 6-2 run to build a 49-44 lead with 2:59 left.

“With the defense we played in the third quarter, we should have blown it open,” Ocean View Coach Jim Harris said. “But they (the Saints) wouldn’t let it happen.”

Said Cvijanovich: “I’m real proud of our kids. They’re tough. A few breaks here and a few breaks there and things might have been different.”

Not to mention a few successful shots, here or there . Outmanned or not against a team that figures to contend for the Southern Section 5-A championship, Santa Clara would have been in much better shape were it not for a cold spell at the end of the second quarter and the start of the third, when it went 6:24 without scoring and had a 29-27 game turn into 37-27.

Jones, a 6-foot 2-inch senior forward, finished with 24 points, 14 in the first half, to lead all scorers. Art Santana added 13 for Santa Clara. Ricky Butler scored 15 for Ocean View (8-0). Doug Rice chipped in with 13 and Desi Hazely 12.

Tonight’s 8:30 final will include another undefeated team, Compton Dominguez (8-0), which beat Westchester, 55-53, Friday night.

Dominguez forward Ronnie Colman had a game-high 29 points, including 17 of the Dons’ 23 points in the second half. He and guard Michael Elliott (18 points) took care of all but eight of the team’s points.

Sophomore forward Zan Mason, a transfer from L.A. Verbum Dei, scored 12 to lead Westchester (4-2), with sophomore guard Sam Crawford adding 11 and junior forward Michael Brown 10.