Calvary Chapel (12-13), which finished the regular season tied for second with Estancia and Costa Mesa, advanced by capping a dramatic comeback that was as feverish as it was unlikely. Calvary is the league’s No. 3 playoff representative. Costa Mesa earned the No. 2 spot with a 52-48 playoff win over Estancia Thursday in the first of the two-game, three-team tiebreaker.
Estancia, playing its third game in three nights (including a 64-59 home win over Calvary on Wednesday), appeared anything but fatigued early. It stormed to a 19-9 first-quarter lead, led at halftime, 30-17, and had a 50-34 edge with only eight minutes separating the visitors from a guaranteed postseason bid.
But Calvary opened the fourth quarter on an 11-0 run, twice pulled within two, then tied the score on an out-of-bounds play that began with three seconds left.
“That’s the first time that play has ever worked,” Calvary Coach Bernie Francis said of junior guard Jeremy Jeranko throwing a lob to the far side of the basket from a sideline spot about 15 feet inside the midcourt line. The pass sailed over a retreating Estancia defender and into the hands of a leaping Travis Ricker. The 6-foot-5 senior, three inches taller than any Estancia player on the floor, caught the pass and laid it in to knot the score with two seconds left.
“We practice that play, and we’ve tried it three of four times in a game this season,” Francis said. “But tonight was the first time it worked.”
