Diamond Bar basketball rallies behind Malcolm Bell, will play Glendora in title game

SAN DIMAS >>  When the Diamond Bar boys basketball needed a bucket down the stretch in the fourth quarter, Malcolm Bell answered the call on both sides of the floor and led the Brahmas past Rancho Verde 62-53 in Friday’s semifinals of San Dimas High School’s Gary Prestesater Classic.

The junior guard finished with a game-high 30 points, including 13 in the fourth quarter, to propel the Brahmas to Saturday’s championship game, where it will face Glendora, a 59-57 winner over Paramount in Friday’s late semifinal.

Luke Jacobson led Glendora with 22 points and 8 rebounds and Noah Smith had 21 points and 8 boards.

Diamond Bar and Glendora will play for the title at 7:30 p.m. at San Dimas.

“It was mainly our teammate (Dylan Stout) going down just before halftime that inspired us in the second half,” Bell said. “(His injury) pushed all of us to finish the game for him.”

Bell put on an offensive clinic in the fourth quarter as the 6-foot-6 guard found his spots and could not be stopped. Bell connected on 5 of 6 from the field and finished a perfect 2 of 2 from beyond the arc in the fourth quarter.

The spectacular individual fourth quarter by Bell capped an excellent late third-quarter push to bring the Brahmas within two points, 40-38, after he scored.

An 11-0 run in the final three minutes of the third quarter was the spark Diamond Bar needed for its eventual fourth-quarter push after trailing by double digits earlier in the quarter.

“I think we just finally settled down,” Diamond Bar head coach Henry Frierson said of the improved shooting late in the second half. “There’s a lot of stuff we got to clean up early in the season, as does everyone else at this time of the year. I thought in the third and fourth quarters our juniors really stepped up and showed some maturity.”

For the Mustangs, it was junior guard Anthony Smith Jr. who caused the Brahmas the most headaches.

Through the first three quarters, Smith led all scorers with 21 points on 9 of 15 shooting and 5 of 8 from the free throw line.

Smith, who finished the game with 27 points, did most of his damage from mid-range and in the paint. The junior guard never settled and never attempted a shot from beyond the arc.

Lackluster shooting and turnovers plagued the Brahmas and Mustangs in the first half. The two teams combined for 20 first-half turnovers and shot less than 40 percent from the field. The Brahmas shot 33 percent from the field in the first half and the Mustangs shot a marginally better clip at 38 percent.

However, Diamond Bar compensated its cold shooting with relentless defense — half-court man-to-man and full-court press. The Brahmas forced four turnovers in the first quarter and forced Smith into tough shots, which often led to transition opportunities on the other end for Diamond Bar.

Smith still scored eight of the Mustangs’ 13 first-quarter points and helped keep the score tied at 13 after the first eight minutes.

In the second quarter, the Brahmas kept up their smothering full-court press defense, but the Mustangs found more success in breaking the press in the second quarter and took advantage in transition. The Mustangs’ success in transition gave them a 21-20 advantage five minutes into the second quarter.

“Defense has always been our staple,” Frierson said. “We defend first before we do anything else. We like to run and gun, but you always have to defend first.”

A couple of Diamond Bar 3-pointers in the closing minutes of the first half gave the Brahmas a slight 27-25 lead into halftime.

In the opening five minutes of the third quarter, the Mustangs came out hot shooting from the field and opened up a double-digit lead on a 13-0 run. The Mustangs held the Brahmas scoreless until the 5:27 mark of the third quarter — a 3-pointer by junior guard Kingson Maik — cutting the lead to 10 points, 40-30.

The 3-pointer sparked the Brahmas’ eventual third-quarter run and set up Bell’s stellar fourth-quarter performance, which ultimately sealed the game for Diamond Bar.