SANTA ANA – Pacifica Christian’s boys basketball team displayed its bright future Saturday at Godinez.
The Tritons, in their first varsity season, started four freshmen and a junior in the CIF-SS Division 6 final against top-seeded Carnegie of Riverside.
The tiny school from Newport Beach flashed potential but the evening belonged to the taller and faster Wolverines.
Carnegie closed the first half with a 21-0 run and dominated the boards en route to a 75-45 victory.
Pacifica Christian (23-4) never led but featured freshman point guard Dominick Harris, who scored a game-high 19 points and added six rebounds.
“The future is very bright,” said Harris, who has already been offered scholarships by Stetson and Cal Baptist. “This game set a high bar for us. We should do well (in the future) and we’ll keep working hard, listening to Coach (Jeff Berokoff). ”
Harris provided Pacifica Christian a glimmer of hope in the second period. He dribbled behind his back at the top of the key and finished a reverse layup that trimmed Carnegie’s lead to 19-14. But the Wolverines (18-6), who beat Division 1A quarterfinalist Corona del Mar, answered with their 21-0 run, sparked by a 3-pointer by junior Julio Arocha.
Berokoff called Harris the top freshman in California and his lineup one of the youngest in finals history.
“Sometimes you have to lose before you can win,” said Berokoff, a former El Modena coach who also started freshmen Cal Whitney, Timmy Bahadoor and Josh Sims.
“(The Wolverines) are really good. … This is going to make us better. We’re so young, this is a great experience for all of us.”
Carnegie’s front-court duo of 7-foot Luka Filipovic and 6-foot-6 Kostas Altinis combined for 31 points and 25 rebounds. Filipovic, a senior born in Serbia, finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds, while Altinis, a junior, had 16 points and 13 rebounds.
Carnegie outrebounded Pacifica Christian, 51-34. The Wolverines’ damage on the boards helped them shoot 53 percent from the field.
Pacifica Christian shot 26 percent from the field, including 4 for 32 from beyond the 3-point arc.
“We got humbled in this game,” Harris said. “But I felt we just missed shots.”
The Tritons were more competitive in the second half. Whitney made two 3-pointers in the fourth and finished with seven points. Bahadoor finished with nine points while Sims added seven.
Contact the writer: dalbano@scng.com
