Lahainaluna takes down Radford, 61-34

Lahainaluna's Carver Locke puts up a jump shot in the lane against Radford. CJ Caraang | SL

Carver Locke scored a game-high 22 points and Lahainaluna knocked off Radford, 61-34, Saturday in the final day of the 18^th annual James Alegre Basketball Invitational preseason boys' tournament at Alegre Gymnasium.

The defending Maui Interscholastic League Division I champion Lunas finished the tournament 4-0, while the Rams ended 0-4. It was not a championship-bracket tournament; instead the 11 teams each played four games over four days.

"Carver, he's going to be a good leader for us," Lahainaluna coach Jason Justus said. "He's a type of kid that can give us points, rebounds, assists. He can play pretty much everywhere on the court, which is good."

Locke, a 6-foot-2 senior, said it was his best game of his career, but deferred credit to the team.

"We played great team basketball," Locke said. "We played very good defense and we showed up tonight."

The game was close for half of the first period when Earl Jay Navarro's 3-pointer pulled Radford to 11-10. But the Lunas closed the half with an 11-0 run and held a double-digit lead the rest of the game.

The Rams, who hadn't scored four the last four minutes of the first quarter, did not get on the board until Navarro's second 3-pointer with 4:40 on the clock in the second. But the Lunas were leading 26-13 and took a 35-17 lead into the half.

It was the first preseason games for both teams. Coaches said their teams needed work, just that the Rams looked like they needed more of it.

"This is our first four games and I saw a lot of things we need to improve on," Justus said.

"Throughout the whole tournament, the main thing was just improvement," first-year Radford coach Travis Armstrong said. "The score didn't necessarily show improvement that we made. Defensively, we did a lot better in that game. It might not have looked it, but the kids understood their positions a little bit more than they had in the previous games.

"Offensively, we made a lot of bad shots the previous games, where there were one pass, two passes (and a) bad shot. This game we passed the ball a lot more, shared the ball a lot more. We got better looks, didn't necessarily fall all the time. We just gotta keep working."

The Lunas were ahead of the game in free throws, shooting 8 of 9, as opposed to the Rams' 2-of-6 shooting.

The Lunas dominated in all their four games, beating Leilehua, 45-38; Farrington 43-26; and Hayward (Calif.), 51-30. The tournament provided the Lunas competition it needs to remain a contender in the MIL.

"The MIL is a different type of basketball," Locke said. "Oahu basketball is a lot better. There was better competition. This gets us more ready for the (state) tournament because state tournament has more Oahu teams."

Jeremi Santos and Tevake Faleta added 12 and 10 points, respectively, for the Lunas.

Jordan Pender and Navarro each led the Rams with eight points each.

Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at [email protected].