Pasadena Wins Tournament, Remains Number One

[ January 3, 2005 Poll ]

Pasadena City College won what could be the toughest eight-team tournament of the season and was the unanimous choice of the 14 voters to top this week's CCCWBCA Poll. Riverside Community College kept its runner-up spot. Idle Antelope Valley College moved up to third to switch positions with San Jose City College who dropped to fourth. Mt. San Antonio College reentered the top five.

The Tournament of the Week was held at San Jose City College. Six of the top 11 squads of COA were entrants meaning two of them would find themselves in the consolation bracket. The games went as the polls subscribed with #9 San Joaquin Delta College defeating #10 College of the Canyons 90-79 and #8 Santa Rosa Junior College scoring 52 points to #11 Reedley College's 49. Sierra College upset both Reedley and Canyons to win the consolation championship and reenter the state poll at #18. Delta met Pasadena in the semifinals and gave the Lancers their closest match of their undefeated season, 55-44. Meanwhile, #3 San Jose was upset on their floor by Santa Rosa, 77-72. San Jose recovered in the final round to take third place over Delta by ten points. Pasadena took their record to 14-0 by taking the championship game 82 to 67 over the Bearcats of Santa Rosa.

The prior week, Canyons warmed up by hosting Riverside in the South Region Game of the Week. The Tigers had to work hard to fend off Canyons, but succeeded by a score of 82-72. Canyons dropped to #15 this week. For the northern counterpart, #8 Santa Rosa traveled to Foothill with the fifth-ranked Owls prevailing, 73-54.

Fullerton hosted a tourney where Mt. San Antonio and themselves were the only ranked teams. Fullerton was #14 and Mt. San Antonio was sixth. Both had 20-plus points wins in the first two days which put them into the title contest. Fullerton gave the defending state champs a game in the 61-51 loss. Fullerton moved up to #11 on the strength of the loss and teams above them being upset. Santa Barbara City College is recovering from injuries well enough to have defeated Cerritos College for third place, 63-57. Santa Monica College sailed to the consolation title.

The 16-team De Anza College Classic was renamed the Mike Gervasoni Memorial Classic after the CCCWBCA Hall of Fame and former De Anza coach who passed away in a car accident last Fall. Much of the rest of state-ranked North Region who were not at San Jose were in this tournament. Butte College was the first of them to fall in a first-round game at Foothill College who shares hosting duties on the first two days.

Napa Valley College eliminated them the following day. Also in the second round, #15 Porterville College, who sported the North's best record at 12-1, fell to #12 Cypress College, 70-56. #7 Lassen College lost to undefeated Lane Community College from Oregon, 73-70. With the tournament moving all games to De Anza for round 3, Foothill was tripped 72-66 by Cypress in the semifinals. Lane pushed eight points by #19 Contra Costa College to join Cypress in the final. Cypress ruined Lane's quest for an undefeated 2004-05 in overtime, 93-90, and take top honors. Third place went to Foothill after they defeated Contra Costa 62-41. Lassen handed Porterville their second loss of the week to take fifth. College of the Sequoias won the consolation side with an 18-point victory over Taft College.

Sister colleges Ventura and Oxnard trade hosting duties for their annual Crossover event. This year it was held at Ventura, the week prior Cypress' Gervasoni triumph. All four of the games were tight. On the first day, Oxnard surprised Cypress with a 12-point margin and Ventura nearly suffered an upset at the hands of Sequoias before winning 62-56. On the second and final day, Oxnard did accomplish an upset, 67-56 over Sequoias. Cypress avoided the same fate against Ventura in their 10-point, 72-62, win. After both events, Cypress entered the top ten and currently sit at #8. Ventura rose half of a position into a tie for 12th.

Orange Coast College began Palomar College's tourney as the favorite and ended it with the championship. Palomar nearly upset them in the semifinals, 65-64, before the Pirates won the title game 58-51 over Irvine Valley College. Palomar took third after defeating College of the Desert 49-32.

Saddleback College struggled their way through their first seven games, but evened their record at the Grossmont tournament. After inching past San Diego Mesa College, 53-51, and having only a little more space with L.A. City College in a 5-point win, they met Grossmont and won the trophy 63-46. Bakersfield College snared third place with wins over Compton Community College and L.A. City. Compton won consolation, 66-62, over Mesa.

Cerro Coso College a four-team tournament. Citrus College and Los Angeles Pierce College have been having their best seasons in recent memory and met in the first round. Citrus won by 25 with Cerro Coso losing to Seattle Community College District of Washington. Citrus left the following day with the first-place award over Seattle, 79-64. Pierce overcame Cerro Coso's homecourt advantage in the 3rd place game, 61-55.

Two games that are expected to play a role in deciding conference champions are the CCCWBCA Games of the Week. In Bay Valley Conference's Valley Division, #18 Sierra College hosts #10 San Joaquin Delta on Tuesday at 6:00 pm. For South Region, Saturday finds #3 Antelope Valley College traveling to Chaffey College for a 1:00 pm tipoff.

Greg Murphy gregm@altair.csustan.edu