Despite 0-3 Week, Mira Costa Coach Remains Confident

What a difference a week has made for the Mira Costa High boys’ basketball team.

A week ago, the Mustangs had a 14-2 record and had climbed to No. 20 in the Cal-Hi Sports News state rankings.

That was before they lost consecutive games to Leuzinger, Culver City and Morningside and dropped out of the rankings.

Although the losses have taken the luster away from the team’s fast start, Coach Glenn Marx is not about to panic.

“I think you have to wait until the end of the season to say how good your team is,” Marx said. “But I think we’re still a pretty good team at this point.”

With any luck, Marx said, the Mustangs could have won two of the three games. The only one-sided game was a 75-59 Ocean League loss Saturday to Culver City.

Mira Costa was defeated by Leuzinger, 67-66, in overtime and had its league record drop to 1-2 with a 79-69 loss Tuesday to defending State Division III champion Morningside.

The Mustangs led by five points in the final minutes against Leuzinger and were ahead by three points in the fourth quarter against Morningside.

Marx said his team may be going through a letdown after winning the St. Louis tournament last month in Honolulu. Mira Costa defeated Southern Section power Crescenta Valley in the final.

“When we came back from Hawaii, we had a week where three starters were out with illnesses,” Marx said. “I think we had kind of a letdown after that tournament. But I think the Morningside game brought us back a little bit. Yesterday’s game is a sign that we’re still the same team that beat teams like Lakewood and Crescenta Valley.”

Marx said the level of competition in the South Bay makes it difficult for any team to have an extended winning streak.

“I’ve said all along that South Bay basketball is very contentious,” Marx said. “It’s just like the (Pacific 10 Conference) this year. It’s just a very competitive area. You don’t see any teams that are undefeated.”

The Mustangs also have one of the youngest teams in the South Bay with only three seniors among their top nine players.

“When six of your top nine players are underclassmen, you’re going to lose some close ones and win some close ones,” he said. “I think when you consider all of those things, you can understand how we can lose games to these opponents.”

Marx is awaiting the rematch with Morningside on Feb. 9 at Mira Costa.

“Regardless of what happens in a very (difficult) league, we’re still going to be around in the playoffs,” he said. “All I know is if I was an opposing coach, I’d hate to draw us in the playoffs.”

A day before a nonleague game against state power Mira Costa last week, Leuzinger boys’ basketball Coach Jimmy Ellis made a bold prediction.

“I really think we have a good chance to win the game,” he said.

As it turned out, the Ellis was right. The Olympians won the game for Ellis’ biggest win in his two seasons as coach.

Leuzinger is 10-8, a marked improvement over last season’s 5-17 record.

More important, the Olympians do not have a senior in their starting lineup. They added more firepower three weeks ago with the addition of 6-foot-7 junior Lamar House, a transfer from Morningside who stepped into the starting lineup and scored 12 points against Mira Costa.

Leuzinger’s leading scorer has been junior guard Jemel Floyd, who averages 15 points a game.

The Olympians also have a promising 6-8 sophomore center in Leonard Butler, who is expected to make an impact when he returns from academic probation.

“We think our best days are ahead of us,” Ellis said. “We think we’ve established a pretty good foundation. We think we’ve shown people we can play a little basketball here and if we keep improving like I think we will, there’s no telling how good we can become.”

With that theme in mind, Ellis has printed up T-shirts that say, “Leuzinger Basketball: A New Direction.”

Leuzinger may not be ready to challenge South Bay powers Inglewood and Peninsula for the Bay League title, but with several talented underclassmen, the future is looking bright.

Last season at this time, basketball coaches from the City Section were upset over a “dead period” that was placed on their teams.

Under City rules, coaches could not schedule games or hold practices with their teams during a two-week span in early January.

A year later, the two-week break is still in existence. Only you will not hear many complaints from coaches.

The reason?

Although teams were not allowed to play from Jan. 6-19, the rule has been modified to give coaches the option of holding practices.

“There’s still a two-week break,” Banning Coach Marc Paez said. “But that (rule change) makes a huge difference because you can still keep the players in shape this way.”

Paez is hoping it will lead to a improvement over last season, when the Pilots went into the break with an 8-7 record only to lose their final 10 games.

“For the most part, I’d say we’ll be better prepared and in better shape to start league play,” Westchester Coach Ed Azzam said.

Paez said it was business as usual for his team during the break.

“We missed one day of practice, but we kept a pretty regular schedule,” he said. “We changed it a little bit so they weren’t doing the same thing all the time. But we didn’t alter it too much.”

If anything, Paez says, his team may have benefited from the break.

“In a way, when you’re playing as well as we were going into the break, you’d like to play every day,” he said. “But we were hit by the flu bug and the layoff has kind of helped.”

Although Azzam is not completely satisfied with the rule, he is holding his complaints to a minimum.

“It’s still a lot of time between games, but I think this will work out a lot better than it did last year,” he said.

Notes

Inglewood guard Sam Turks is earning a reputation for playing well under pressure. Earlier in the season, the 5-foot-10 junior made a last-second basket to give the Sentinels a victory over rival Morningside. Then he accomplished a similar feat last week when he made a jump shot at the buzzer to give the Sentinels a 54-52 Bay League win over Peninsula. . . . El Segundo High will sponsor its 1993 alumni baseball game, a reunion and get-together for all Eagle players from 1929-1988, on Feb. 6 at Recreation Park in El Segundo. There will be batting practice at 10 a.m., a home run derby at 12:45 p.m., introductions at 1 p.m. and the alumni game at 1:05 p.m. Admission is $3 for adults or $1 for age 18 and younger. Information: Coach John Stevenson at (310) 615-2667.

With its last-second win over defending State Division II champion Artesia Saturday, Morningside secured its position as the top-ranked team in the latest Southern Section Division III boys’ basketball poll. Bishop Montgomery is sixth and South Torrance is seventh in Division III. Serra is fifth in Division IV and Chadwick climbed to sixth in Division V. . . . In girls’ basketball, Morningside is ranked No. 1 in Division III. North Torrance is ninth in Division II and St. Bernard is fifth in Division IV.

South Bay Boys’ Basketball Top 10 Selected by Times Sportswriters Through Tuesday’s Games Rank, School, League Record

1 Morningside (Ocean): 17-4

2 Bishop Montgomery (Mission): 13-2

3 Westchester (Metro): 11-5

4 Serra (Camino Real): 11-7

5 Inglewood (Bay): 10-8

6 Peninsula (Bay): 11-6

7 South Torrance (Pioneer): 15-2

8 Mira Costa (Ocean): 14-5

9 Carson (Southern): 6-3

10 Redondo (Ocean): 10-8