By Ed Piper
When Scottie Pippen came into the Montgomery High gym before his son's game against the Aztecs Thursday night, Nov. 15, the home team cheerleaders and others started screaming.
It brought to mind for an old-timer the screams of girls on the Beatles' British Invasion tour in the United States in 1964.
Pippen, the 6'9" Chicago Bulls Hall-of-Famer, was good-natured with all the fuss as students came rushing over to his spot in the main stands. Looking fit and not appearing much older than in his playing days, he kept a broad grin and let the Montgomery students take selfies, crowding into a semi-circle in front of him.
But the real show was Scotty Pippen Jr. and his teammates on Sierra Canyon, the defending state Open Division champs and the number-five-ranked team in the nation.
Looking tiny next to two seven-footers from the L.A. private school, Montgomery guard Kyle Paranada, listed at 5'9", 145 pounds, wasn't intimidated and helped the underdog Aztecs move the ball against the Trailblazers' pressure.
Teammate Rahin Williams hit a three, as did Paranada (his name means "for nothing"). In fact, the 6'2" Williams plowed a one-handed slam down early in the game, sending the full house into mini-hysteria.
The hosts, shooting way over their heads, led at 17-15 with three minutes left in the first quarter.
But trailing by one, 20-19, Coach Andre Chevalier's elite visitors reeled off 24 points in a row to take a commanding 43-20 lead and to silence the crowd, which had come to see Scottie, Scotty, and Kenyon Martin Jr. and the other names on Sierra Canyon.
Montgomery had come back to earth and suffered the pangs of mortality before the behemoths of Chatsworth.
By halftime, Sierra Canyon led 62-28, and at the end of the third quarter, 90-37.
The show didn't end early though. Cassius Stanley, Chevalier's 5-star-rated prospect, a 6'5" shooting guard rated the 25th player in the U.S. by ESPN, tempted the crowd with a dunk attempt in the third quarter. He threw the ball off the backboard, but missed the slam when he didn't catch the ball square. There was a sigh from the crowd.
But later in the third quarter, the Trailblazers leading by over 50 points and indulging in playground ball, the chiseled Stanley stole a ball at midcourt, looked back to eye where his defender was, then wound up and clocked a one-handed slam with his right arm. The crowd went bananas. They had gotten what they came for.
Before the game, Paranada, the diminutive Aztec point guard, said, "(We want to) limit their layups and dunks." He wasn't kidding.
At one point in the second quarter, Sierra Canyon went into Phi Slamma Jamma mode, with a flurry of dunks within a short time. This came at the end of the Trailblazers' 24-point blitz blowing the game open. Stanley crushed one after a Montgomery miss, followed by 6'4" freshman guard Amari Bailey.
Shortly thereafter, Pippen dunked as the third of three straight baskets by him. Then Scotty fed Cassius for a jam after stealing the ball. The assembled faithful were into delirium.
Christian Koloko, the Trailblazers' starting seven-footer, was easily handled by the shorter Aztecs double-teaming him and pushing him around. Ineffective, he was removed by Chevalier less than four minutes into the game.
The Arizona commit didn't have a dunk until the second half, when the game was far out of reach for host Montgomery.
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