Seahawks storm to CIF finals

SANTA ANA — Anthony Brown said the Ocean View High boys’ basketball team wanted to set the tone early in Friday night’s CIF Southern Section Division IV-AA semifinal game.

The No. 3-seeded Seahawks, as it turned out, wanted to play smash-mouth basketball against No. 2 Serra.

“We wanted to attack them right from the beginning and not them let them have a chance to get in the game, or think they could play with us,” junior guard Anthony Brown said. “We just wanted to smash them in the mouth.”

Mission accomplished.

Ocean View breezed out to a 17-2 lead at Mater Dei High, ultimately hanging on for a 46-41 victory that put the Seahawks in the CIF finals for the first time since 2000.

The Seahawks (23-7) will play Inglewood on either Thursday or Friday, at either Colony High or back at Mater Dei. Ocean View will be going for its first title since 1998, when it won the Division III-A title over Barstow.

No. 4-seeded Inglewood was a 97-93 overtime victor over top-seeded Bishop Montgomery in the other Division IV-AA semifinal Friday night.

In the final, Ocean View would definitely love to have another start like it had against Serra. Less than five minutes into the game, and the Seahawks held the 15-point lead after a three-point play by senior Mason Jones.

“We wanted to come out and just put them on their heels,” Ocean View Coach Jimmy Harris said. “We wanted to come out real aggressive. We knew they had a good scheme on defense. They like to trap, they like to disrupt you on offense. We’re a running team anyway, so they were going to try to do what they could to slow us down. For the most part, they did a great job of that.

“This game was just two real young teams trying as hard as they could to get to the championship. It showed up in the offense. It was not crisp; it was ugly at times. But really where it was won was who played the better half-court defense. Tonight it was us, thank goodness.”

Serra (23-8) did battle back. The Cavaliers trailed by just seven at halftime, 27-20, and cut it to four points early in the third quarter.

But Ocean View responded with a baseline jumper and a pair of free throws by junior center Ryan Okwudibonye, and the lead was back to nine.

Serra couldn’t get closer than five points in the final stanza.

“I think it was our maturity as a team,” Okwudibonye said. “In the beginning of the season, we’d always kind of fall apart in the second half. We’d do really good in the first half and we’d kind of back off the gas. But as we’re getting more mature, I think we’ve just brought it together.”

Okwudibonye and Jones shared high scoring honors with 10 points each. Brown had eight points and 11 rebounds, and sophomore guard Billy Keller also scored eight.

Aaron Delgado had seven points and 10 boards, while Avery Johnson had three points and nine rebounds.

Senior Antonio Gayala had nine points to lead Serra, whose press was sometimes effective.

“But we weren’t able to capitalize on the other end,” Serra Coach Dwan Hurt said. “We were turning it back over, and missing free throws didn’t help at all either ... We just happened to run into a better team.”

The Seahawks, meanwhile, can’t wait for their shot at a championship.

“It feels pretty good [to advance],” Brown said. “It was my goal when I came to Ocean View to lead this school to another CIF championship, so it feels good.”

 Marina High fell at top-seeded Thousand Oaks, 89-57, in a semifinal of the CIF Southern Section Division II-A playoffs.

Marina, the fifth-seeded team, finished its season with a record of 23-7.