California notebook

#1-ranked Fullerton continued its winning ways with four victories en route to the championship of the state's largest tournament, the 16-team Wells Fargo Classic in Riverside. Michael Earl scored 27 points in the final, an 81-74 win over Orange Empire Conference rival Riverside. Trayvon Williams led RCC with 26 points in the final game. Fullerton defeated three quality teams (East LA, Mt. San Jacinto and San Bernardino Valley) on the way to the championship game. The Hornets are now 14-0 on the season.

In the third-place game, Ventura topped San Bernardino Valley, 76-67. Chaffey edged Long Beach City, 95-89 in the fifth-place game while San Diego City bested Pasadena, 87-76 in the consolation final.

While Fullerton, the #1 team in the South, was winning one tournament, College of the Siskiyous, the #1-ranked team in the North, won another. The Eagles topped Sierra, 75-60, in the championship game of the Modesto tourney, but their biggest win of the weekend was a 75-61 victory over previously-unbeaten Los Angeles City in the second round. San Joaquin Delta beat Shasta, 95-71 for third place while LA City beat the host team, 74-71, for the consolation championship.

Other highlights

There were three other tournaments of interest in the Southland over the weekend.

Defending state champion Fresno lost in the first round of the LA Southwest Intensity Classic, dropping a 116-113 double-overtime decision to Citrus. Tron Smith led the Owls with 38 points while Keena Payton (a younger brother of NBA future Hall of Famer Gary) led Fresno with 29. But the Rams recovered to beat Mira Costa, 100-81, and El Camino, 111-88, to capture the consolation championship.

With the Rams out of the way, the door was left open for Moorpark to win the tourney championship. The Raiders, who play a similar style to Fresno, topped Orange Coast College, 82-61, in the championship game. Citrus edged the host team, LA Southwest, 72-70 in the third-place matchup.

Meanwhile, Compton captured the Roadrunner Round-up at Rio Hondo with an 88-73 win over Santa Monica. But the Tartars' toughest test came in the tournament's opening round when Kevin Thomas scored with one second left to give Compton a 64-62 win over a tough West LA squad. After WLAC's Joseph Bolden had tied the score with a pair of free throws with 6.2 seconds left, Thomas took the inbounds pass and went coast-to-coast a la Tyus Edney (for UCLA in the 1995 NCAA tourney) for the winning lay-up.

And up in beautiful Santa Barbara, Cypress overcame an 11-point halftime deficit to top Oxnard in the championship game. Cypress got 17 points from tourney M.V.P. Brandon Void in the win and improved its record to 8-4. In the third-place game, the host Vaqueros overcame a 15-point deficit to top Mt. San Antonio, 73-66. PG Will Schalich had a huge game with 17 points, 6 assists and 4 steals for SBCC.

Coming This Week

Major tournaments continue up and down the state this week:

In Stockton, Delta College hosts its annual Holiday Tourney, welcoming such perennial powers as San Francisco, Ohlone and Modesto. Butte, Cuesta, Lassen and Merced fill out the field.

In Santa Rosa, West Valley travels up the 101 to take on the host Bear Cubs as well as Feather River, Yuba, Los Medanos, Shasta and American River. Mendocino rounds out the field for the Thursday-Friday-Saturday tourney.

In Ventura, the Roy Gilmore Memorial Tournament features the host Pirates taking on Compton, Riverside, West LA, Desert, Porterville, Columbia and Allan Hancock.

And in Pasadena, Fullerton puts its unbeaten record on the line against the likes of Chaffey, Long Beach City, Cypress, San Bernardino Valley, LA Valley and the host Lancers.

Also, there are a couple of interesting non-conference games late in the week in the Bay Area. #1-ranked Siskiyous travels to Aptos to take on Cabrillo on Friday, while the night before San Jose travels up the 280 to Foothill in a tasty Coast Conference crossover game.

We'll have reports on these two games, as well as wrap-ups from the Delta and Santa Rosa tourneys, next week.

Player Spotlight

Tron Smith of Citrus grabs the spotlight this week by scoring 38 points in the first round of the LA Southwest Intensity Classic to help the Owls upset defending state champion Fresno, 116-113, in double overtime.

The multi-talented Smith is a bounceback from Arizona State. He's a 6-2 do-everything guard who is adept at driving the lane, shooting from the perimeter and creating for his teammates. This is his first year at Citrus after sitting out last year and playing for the Sun Devils as a freshman in 2003-04.

In high school, he starred for Canyon Springs of Moreno Valley (just outside Riverside) alongside Andre McGee (now at Louisville), Richard Cobbs and Carlton Arnwine (both of whom are now at Saddleback). At the time, then-sophomore McGee got much of the publicity, but the team went 26-5 in Tron's senior season while struggling to near-.500 records the next two seasons with McGee (but after Smith had graduated), showing how key Tron was to their success.

Tron is a certain mid-to-high major player at the Division I level. Word is he's headed to St. Mary's of the West Coast Conference next season.