PHOTOS: Crean Lutheran marches on to semifinals with 75-57 win over Culver City

Koat Keat of Crean Lutheran heads toward the basket in Tuesday’s CIF playoff game. (Photos courtesy John Luciano and Howard Lyon, Crean Lutheran Shutterbugs)

Crean Lutheran High School’s boys basketball team was up to the challenge from the start Tuesday night jumping out to an early eight-point lead in a CIF 2A quarterfinal game on its home court.

The top-seeded Saints were able to fight off a couple runs from Culver City, which battled from start to finish. But the Saints had too much offensive firepower and defense and captured a 75-57 victory over Culver City.

Crean Lutheran (16-2) moves on the semifinals Friday night against Dominguez at Dominguez, which won a coin flip to host the game.

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Michael Birket scored 26 points and made seven 3-pointers to lead the Saints. It’s the second time in three seasons that Crean Lutheran has advanced to the semifinals under Coach Nate Klitzing.

Koat Keat had 17 points, 20 rebounds and 10 assists and James Agany had 13 points, 11 rebounds and four assists for Crean Lutheran.

“I think the difference was our activity and our length and just shrinking the court,” said Coach Nate Klitzing. “It was a team effort and ultimately, we laid it all out on the floor the whole game. Every possession, that was being locked in to what they did and Culver City is a heck of a team and they’ve had an awesome season so congrats to them.

“But it was just our guys locking into the scouting report and knowing on the floor what we wanted to do and they excecuted it.”

Crean Lutheran jumped out to an 8-0 lead in the opening minutes, much to the delight of the energized Crean Lutheran fans, who nearly packed the small gymnasium. Crean Lutheran led 17-9 after one quarter but Culver City made a charge in the second quarter, cutting the lead to 24-23 on a 3-pointer by Josh Smith with 2:07 left.

However, Crean Lutheran finished the quarter strong and moved out to a 38-28 halftime lead on a 3-pointer by Keat with 10 seconds left.

Birket continued his outstanding play with eight more points in the third quarter helping Crean Lutheran outscore Culver City 18-8 and the Saints kept the pressure on in the fourth quarter.

“Mike’s been doing it all season,” Klitzing said of Birket. “He had a tremendous game, just lights out. I feel like he gets our first bucket every game and gets us going on the right track in that first quarter. He kept it going today.”

Birket credited his teammates for the win.

“We shared the ball really well today and found the open guys and we made the extra pass,” he said. “We just kept being unselfish all night, especially in the fourth quarter when we started to run up the score and that’s the reason why we won today.”

Birket said it was the most 3-pointers he’s made in a game.

“It’s not without my teammates,” he said. “I have to thank them.”

Jackson Hopps scored 20 points and Smith 15 to lead Culver City (11-7).

—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com