Riverside Poly and Damien boys basketball teams advance to Riverside Kiwanis Tournament final – Press Enterprise

RIVERSIDE — The Riverside Poly boys basketball team had the lead at halftime, but the offense still had not found its groove.

Things changed when the Bears returned from the locker room. Poly outscored Hillcrest 34-14 over the first 12 minutes of the second half and pulled away for a 64-49 victory Thursday night in a semifinal game of the 40th Riverside Kiwanis Tournament.

The Bears (6-1) will square off against Damien (9-1) for the tournament championship Friday at 7 p.m. at Poly High School.

Poly knocked down only 4 of 15 shots in the first quarter, but JRob Croy’s 3-pointer in the final seconds of the first half gave the Bears a 26-24 lead at the break. Poly then opened the second half by making 9 of 12 shots to extend that advantage to 48-35.

As usually is the case with Poly basketball teams, it was defensive stops that helped spark things at the other end of the court.

“Coach (Travis Showalter) talked to us at halftime about locking in on defense,” said junior guard Chris Holland, who scored a game-high 24 points on 10-of-14 shooting. “Once we took care of business there, the offense started to get some good looks.”

Poly drained 10 of 23 shots from behind the arc during Thursday evening’s game, including a 7-for-14 effort after halftime. Holland, Cian Phipps and Kory Dodson each nailed a pair of 3-pointers in the second half, and Kam Dodson sank another.

Hillcrest (7-3) made only 1 of 12 shots from the field in the third quarter, and the Trojans missed their first seven shots in the fourth quarter. Hillcrest was able to get to the free-throw line and sank 14 of 19 shots from the stripe in the second half.

Kory Dodson finished with 12 points, while Phipps added 10 points and seven rebounds. Austin Woolfolk grabbed nine rebounds.

McKel Shedrick led Hillcrest with 15 points, including an 8-for-8 performance at the free-throw line. Shedrick and Nate Bowden had seven rebounds apiece for the Trojans.

Damien dominates second half against Arlington

Eli Garner scored a game-high 20 points, and Nate Garcia registered a double-double with 16 points and 14 rebounds as Damien cruised to a 69-40 victory over Arlington in the first semifinal game of the Riverside Kiwanis Tournament.

Garner knocked down all four of his shots from the field, including three from behind the arc, to give Damien a 15-10 lead at the end of the first quarter, but Arlington (8-4) opened the second quarter with a 7-0 run to take its only lead of the game.

Damien answered back immediately and outscored the Lions 14-2 the rest of the half to take a 29-19 lead into the locker room.

Garcia, a 7-foot junior center, missed two games recently because of an illness and played only a handful of minutes Tuesday in the second round of the tournament. Garcia logged 22 minutes Thursday and scored 12 of his points during the third quarter.

Arlington only trailed 50-35 entering the final period, but Damien put the game away with a 17-0 run. Xavier Clinton scored 13 points for the Spartans, all of them coming in succession during that fourth-quarter run.

Lincoln Liggins had 13 points and seven rebounds to lead Arlington, while his younger brother Legend finished with 12 points. Ryan Wheeler added nine points and four blocks for the Lions.