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“In towns and cities... there is no more important institution than the local paper.”
Warren Buffett
La Mirada High capped off a second straight Rumble on the Hill Tournament championship with a 53-46 win over Damien High last Saturday night at Sunny Hills High. Sophomore Gene Roebuck was named the tournament’s most valuable player. PHOTO BY LOREN KOPFF.
November 26, 2024
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
FULLERTON-Last season, the La Mirada High boys basketball team began the season winning all five games of the Rumble on the Hill Tournament, formerly the Rumble on Rosecrans Tournament. The Matadores edged Damien High 55-54 to capture the tournament.
This season, it was déjà vu as the teams met again for the championship game of the 7th Annual Rumble on the Hill Tournament and the Matadores came out the victors, 53-46, withstanding a late rally by the Spartans.
La Mirada jumped to a 12-0 lead after the first 4:07 of the game and held an 18-2 advantage with 1:14 remaining in the first quarter. The Matadores got all their points from seniors Julien Gomez (four points), junior King-Riley Owens (six points) and sophomore Gene Roebuck (eight points). But as hot of a start it was by the blue and gold, it was the opposite in the second quarter.
Damien stormed back in the second quarter and in a span of 3:30, scored the final 12 points of the half to tie the game at 25-25. Seven-footer Nathaniel Garcia scored 12 of his game-high 25 points in the stanza, including the tying basket with 27.2 seconds left.
“I’m not a big fan of calling timeouts to bail out our guys,” said La Mirada head coach Randy Oronoz. “We have an experienced group. We’ve been through a lot of big games, and I told them at halftime, they have to figure it out; we have to figure it out as a team. I’m glad we saved those timeouts because they came in use at the end.”
La Mirada would regain the lead on a basket from senior M.J. Smith a little over two minutes into the second half, ending a shooting drought by the Matadores. In a span of 11:17 from late in the first quarter to the Smith basket, La Mirada was three of 16 from the field. However, they would go on a tear after that, connecting on nine of the last 17 shots it took.
“We’re playing a well-coached team,” said Oronoz. “We knew it was going to be a grind out. We told them it was going to be in the low 50s, and it was. They had a drought; we had a drought, and it’s a game of runs and we ended up with the last run. Complements to them; we might see them in two other tournaments. I’m not happy about that, but it was a good win.”
Garcia gave his team its first lead with 5:04 left in the third quarter at 29-27 and the Spartans would take the lead three other times, never leading by a basket each time. The fourth quarter began with another Garcia basket, making it 39-38 Spartans. But half a minute into the stanza, senior Jarrett Cole drained a three-pointer for his only points of the game to give La Mirada the lead for good at 41-39.
That was the beginning of an 8-0 run and with 2:01 remaining in the game, Smith sealed the deal with his last basket off a feed from Roebuck, making it 50-42. Garcia and Eli Garner would score in succession in a 23 second span. But that wasn’t enough to prevent the Matadores from another tournament championship.
Roebuck scored 22 points and had four rebounds as he was named the tournament’s most valuable player, scoring 92 points in the five games. Smith had 10 points, four rebounds and two steals while Gomez and Owens each had eight points and combined for nine rebounds.
The Matadores began the season with a 64-45 win over North Torrance High on Nov. 18, followed by a 78-39 win over Don Lugo High the next night and a 79-67 victory over San Clemente High on Nov. 20. After a day off, La Mirada squeaked past Canyon High 80-76 in overtime last Friday.
“We played [Damien] in the summer as well and it was another close game,” said Oronoz. “They know what we do; we know what they do, and it comes down to making plays and tonight we made a couple more plays than they did.
“Coach Dave Martinez does a great job of our defense,” he continued. “We schemed, we planned, and it was a total group effort. It’s not easy to stop those guys. I think they’ve been averaging in the 70s and holding them to 46 is a testament to how hard the guys work and how hard coach Dave works.”
Now, the Matadores will have a quick turnaround as they will fly to Peoria, Illinois to participate in the Kevin Brown Memorial Tournament of Champions where they will face Morton (IL) High on Wednesday, St. Louis-based Vashon High on Friday and Gibbs High out of St. Petersburg, FL on Saturday. Those three teams have yet to play a game this season. La Mirada will fly out a day before its first game and return on Sunday.
“They invited us out there,” said Oronoz. “The St. John Bosco coach told me if we had the chance to do, do it. It’s a phenomenal tournament, so I’m kind of going in a little blind. But I’m excited to do it knowing we’re playing really good competition. It’s an invite only tournament. They’re going to have a big turkey ready for us on Thanksgiving,
“With La Mirada, we try to do everything that the private schools do at a public school,” he added. “We have some of the best coaches on our staff. We have the best facilities; we have a great administration that supports us. We get good kids in; they like to play and they’re great character kids and that’s why people come here. We do exactly what a private school does. We play the private schools and tonight we came out on the winning end.”