STUDIO CITY — The fifth-seeded Notre Dame boys basketball team took down top-seeded Harvard-Westlake 68-61 on Friday night to punch its ticket to the CIF Southern Section Open Division championship for the first time in program history.
“We set a goal to win an Open championship,” Notre Dame head coach Matt Sargent said. “They’re the top program that’s done it in the last two years. We knew we’d have to go through them, so I’m grateful to get one more chance to accomplish our goal.”
Harvard-Westlake (29-2) has one more game left in pool play when it hosts Santa Margarita on Tuesday at 7 p.m. Notre Dame (26-6) has a bye and a five-day break before the championship on March 1 at Toyota Arena in Ontario.
Notre Dame’s Tyron Stokes scored 24 points and Zach White added 23 points. Nik Khamenia was the Wolverines’ top scorer with 31 points.
The Knights forced a turnover with five seconds left in the third quarter after going on a 12-0 scoring run to go into the final frame with a 47-43 advantage.
The shots weren’t falling until Stokes — who was double-teamed in the post throughout the evening — pushed his way through defenders in the paint for a layup that gave Notre Dame a 38-37 advantage.
“He’s a dominant player and he’s a high-energy player,” White said of Stokes. “He’s always trying to play hard, high energy on defense and offense and the other players on the team feed off of it.”
The Wolverines battled back in the fourth quarter but White’s multi-level scoring kept them from taking the lead. Four-star point guard and Rutgers commit Lino Mark engineered the offense, one time appearing to go for a turnaround jumper but instead making the extra pass to White for a dunk and a 58-51 lead.
Mark missed multiple games throughout the season due to injury but was healthy enough to compete for the entirety of the playoffs.
“That’s my point guard,” White said. “We’ve been playing really hard, I love that he’s back.”
White was key throughout the game. Notre Dame outscored Harvard-Westlake 17-11 in the second quarter to take a 33-29 lead at halftime and White was responsible for 10 of those points.
He sparked an 8-0 scoring run when he rebounded a missed 3-pointer and got the put-back. NaVorro Bowman and White sank back-to-back 3-pointers to give Notre Dame a 28-22 advantage with 3:23 left in the second frame.
“He’s just a winner,” Sargent said of White. “That kid just does whatever he needs to do throughout a game to win, whether it’s shooting, attacking the basket, guarding four, five positions. He’s just an unbelievable winner.”
Notre Dame and Harvard-Westlake know each other well. It was the third time the teams met this season — the Wolverines had come out on top in both contests but the latter was decided by only three points.
Both teams were unbeaten in pool play heading into Friday night’s matchup.
“After losing to them twice, it really hurt,” White said. “It was just a mental aspect. We had to play harder than the last time. We were right there with them neck in neck, but we wanted to finish it this time.”