war on the floor

SoCalHoops Recruiting News

War On The Floor: Final Report From
Dave Keefer--(June 28, 2001)

	What:	War on the Floor 2001 Tournament
	When:	June 23-27
	Where	Pierce College (Gold Bracket)
		Taft HS (Silver Bracket)

[Dave Keefer writes regularly for California Preps, and he is covering the War on the Floor Tournament for us as well. Here's his final report from the War on the Floor]

Fernando Sampson

As expected Fairfax won the Gold Bracket of the War On The Floor tournament. What wasn’t expected was that Sylmar was the opponent. Sylmar played a very respectable game and wound up losing 82-67. But Clovis West beat Sylmar last night to qualify for the Championship. They chose not to show up. As reported yesterday (Day Four article) this put the event organizers in a tough spot and they had every right to be upset. Bort Escoto, Charles White, Dennis Magro, and a ton of volunteer support staff worked very hard to put on a quality and well-run tournament. Dennis was still trying this morning to get Clovis to honor their commitment. Talking to an assistant coach was fruitless and calls to head coach Vance Wallberg were not returned. Dennis asks "What kind of example does this set for the Clovis players? Doesn’t keeping your word mean anything?" We asked Dennis later what the final score of last night’s Clovis win over Sylmar was. It was not posted on the board at the gym and as it turns out the omission was on purpose (and on principle). Dennis said in effect, "Clovis who?"

Josh Shipp

Well, who needs ‘em? A Fairfax/Clovis West game would have been an interesting match-up but Sylmar stepped in to help provide an entertaining game. A shot from downtown by Louis Darby gave Sylmar an early lead at 7-5. But that was their last lead. When Fernando Sampson stroked a trey to make it 12-9 in favor of Fairfax, the lead would never change hands again. Sylmar had two new players (that we noticed) to join the roster for this game so they hoped to keep up with the deep Fairfax bench. Big Luis Solis posted up and put a nice power move on Alex Bausley and scored with his left hand. Later Branden Brawer had a timely put back. But these guys were not in game form yet and not ready to be impact players. Fairfax seems loaded with impact players, even without Evan Burns who is in Washington D.C. for the NBA Players Camp. Sylmar was not in awe and they were playing to win. But it seemed that for every nice shot Sylmar made, Fairfax would make two. The half ended at 49-30 but it seemed more competitive than that.

And it was. Sylmar came out for the second half and went right at Fairfax again. When Darby hit five consecutive points, capped with a trey, the score was 51-37 and Sylmar wasn’t conceding anything. Another three-pointer by Joseph Dixon cut the lead down to 62-51 and there was still nearly nine minutes left. Then Sampson hit a three to start a 10-3 Fairfax run to make it 73-55. Game over? No way. Sylmar ran off seven straight of their own, capped by an athletic drive to the hoop by Darby. The score stood at 73-62 with 3:40 to go but Sylmar had started to finally run out of gas. Fairfax was able to kill the clock and make free throws the rest of the way. This was a well-played game by both sides. Congratulations to Fairfax and Sylmar for putting on a good show to cap off the tournament.

Clovis who??

Here’s the scoring summary:

Fairfax –

Alex Bausley 18. He scored inside & outside and was very impressive the whole tournament.

Jasha Blunt 15. Showed a beautiful jumper and is very athletic.

Fernando Sampson 14. Ditto - see Blunt.

Kevin Bell 7. Didn’t seem as involved in the offense tonight, but didn’t have to be.

Josh Shipp 6. With more touches his time will come.

Jason Gilzene. He came off the bench to score 18. This guy can really play also. Will be hard to keep him on the bench.

Sylmar –

Louis Darby 28. He tries to do too much at times, and needs to work on going to his left. But he is the real deal and still has a big upside.

Sam Harris 17. A real competitor. He’s not afraid to go in amongst the giants and will finish most of the time. Can stroke the jumper occasionally too.

Joseph Dixon 7. Another gamer who can score also.

In the Silver bracket championship game, Hart beat El Camino 60-49. In the girl’s championship game, Littlerock beat Chatsworth 49-41.