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February 27, 2025
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO-With a trip to the CIF Southern California Regionals on the line, La Mirada High did all it could to assure itself a chance of that opportunity. Needing a win at JSerra High this past Tuesday night, the Matadores scratched and clawed their way back in the second half after falling behind by as many as eight points early in the second quarter.
While the Gateway League champions ended pool play action of the Open Division with a 64-58 win over the Lions, La Mirada’s season came to end following a series of tie-breaking procedures.
“I had an assistant watching the [Santa Margarita High/Harvard-Westlake High] game and once we saw [Harvard-Westlake] beat them by nine, we were trying to get [our lead] to seven,” said La Mirada head coach Randy Oronoz.
La Mirada took the lead for good nearly midway through the fourth quarter on a three-pointer from sophomore Gene Roebuck. That would be the start of a 12-3 run, which ended with Roebuck converting a three-point play with 1:12 left in the game. After that, the Matadores didn’t score until the buzzer sounded as they saw JSerra score five straight points.
The Matadores, JSerra and Santa Margarita all went 1-3 in pool play action, splitting their games with each other. The next tiebreaker is point differential, which went to JSerra, while La Mirada and Santa Margarita were tied in that department. The fourth tiebreaker is points allowed in which Santa Margarita yielded 251 points to La Mirada’s 270.
“We turned it over late and we were hoping they would foul us,” said Oronoz. “So, we had to play the opposite way around, basically. We were fouling, up five, which is the weirdest thing ever, and trying to rebound and play fast. If it goes into points allowed, we definitely lost that.”
The game was close until late in the first quarter when the Lions scored nine straight points to take a 19-11 lead with 6:40 left in the first half. However, the Matadores gained a burst of energy and turned that deficit into a 24-19 lead in a span of 4:15. Roebuck and junior King-Riley Jones were part of that scoring spree, combining for nine points and two assists.
The Matadores would own a 31-26 halftime lead, but it wasn’t that easy as Roebuck and senior Julien Gomez were held scoreless on a combined three shots taken in the first quarter. The last time those two did not score in the opening quarter in the same game was on Dec. 14 against Fairmont Prep. Gomez wouldn’t score until nearly midway through the second quarter and his basket gave La Mirada a 20-19 lead.
“They did a good job of loading up on them,” said Oronoz. “They know what it is; they know they’re our two best players. So, they did a really good job of taking it away. Credit to us and Gene; Gene did a really good job of finding teammates. We just had to knock down shots. It didn’t happen in the first quarter, but it ended up happening later.”
JSerra began the second half with seven straight points with B.J. Davis-Ray giving his team a two-point lead 1:36 into the half. After that, the teams traded baskets 11 straight times and with 5.6 seconds left in the stanza, junior Andrew Castro scored on an offensive putback to make it 48-45.
JSerra had a 37-20 advantage in rebounds with seven players grabbing at least three boards. Part of that could be the fact that four starters were at least 6’6” while the tallest starters for La Mirada-Roebuck and senior M.J. Smith-stand at 6’5”. On top of that, Castro’s rebound at the end of the third quarter was the only one on the offensive end.
“We don’t crash the offensive glass because teams in the Open Division are really good in transition,” said Oronoz. “We send guys back and try to take away their transition to sacrifice we try and make. It is what it is; we like our odds better in set defense rather than transitioning defense.”
Roebuck led all scorers with 23 points and had three rebounds while Jones added a season-high 17 points and four rebounds. Gomez, who was held to a season-low four points, grabbed seven rebounds. This was the sixth time this season Gomez, the University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley commit, has been held to single digits in scoring.
“Hopefully this is something he learns and takes to the next level,” said Oronoz of Gomez. “He’s had a great career; I think he finished with over 2,400 points in his career, just shy of 2,500. I’m just happy that he came to us and stuck it out all four years for us. No one is going to judge him on one game. Everyone who has ever played the game knows how special he is.”
La Mirada was over 50 percent shooting from the field despite connecting on seven of 21 three-pointers. However, the Matadores were true on seven straight shots during one stretch in the second quarter and another seven straight shots in the third quarter.
The Matadores, who were playing in the Open Division for the first time in school history, finish the season at 25-7. Before the playoffs began, they had not lost consecutive games, but fell to Harvard-Westlake 73-50, Notre Dame High/Sherman Oaks 71-65 and Santa Margarita 68-61 in the playoffs. Those three, plus JSerra advance to the Southern California Regionals.
“It’s four road games and unfortunately for us, we didn’t have a high enough draw to get a home game,” said Oronoz. “We thought we had an opportunity against Notre Dame; we had an opportunity against Santa Margarita. We just didn’t pull it out. It’s hard to win in this division and it’s even harder to win on the road. I’m just really proud of our guys for fighting this fourth game.”
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