Above: Pasadena’s Marcus Harvey. (Correspondent Photo by James Carbone).

By Keith Lair, Staff Writer

PASADENA – Marcus Harvey was backed into a corner this season.
And he’s delivered.
Pasadena High School basketball coach Tim Tucker said the 6-foot-5 senior had to find his place on the Pacific League championship boys basketball team. The swingman did, from the corner of the court.
Harvey has become a key contributor to the Bulldogs in consistently hitting 3-point shots from the corner. He’s one reason why Tucker thinks the Bulldogs can make another legitimate run at a second consecutive CIF-Southern Section Division II-AA championship.
“He forces the power forwards to go out and defend in a spot where they normally aren’t comfortable at,” Tucker said.
It was a big boost in last Friday’s first-round game against St. Bernard, a rematch of last season’s division championship game. Harvey had one of his best shooting games of the season in scoring 18 points.
The Bulldogs, seeded third in the playoffs, defeated the Del Rey League’s No. 3 team, 70-61.
The Bulldogs will play host to Arroyo Valley, 18-9, in the second round tonight at 7:30. The teams met in the Rose City Classic in the same gym in November, with the 22-5 Bulldogs prevailing in overtime, 64-57.
“No one can beat us if we play defense,” Harvey said. “We’re a young team, and I`m not sure if that was factor (against St. Bernard). We just have to play our kind of ball, and that’s a lock-down defense.
“Then, no one can beat us.”
But it is not necessarily defense that has made Harvey stand out this season. It’s on the offensive end.
Keion Bell is the recognized scorer on the team, and nearly every team that plays the Bulldogs knows that. Bell who typically scores more than 30 points a game, frequently gets double-teamed.
“He takes a lot of pressure of Keion,” Tucker said of Harvey.
Tucker admitted he wasn’t sure how Harvey would adapt this season. He transferred from Arcadia after his sophomore season and played sporadically last season as a junior.
“He has more than surpassed what we expected,” Tucker said. “He’s done excellent things offensively for us. Along with Keion and George (Toyama), we have three excellent options. Keion’s going to get his 25, 28 points every game, but Marcus gives us an excellent third option.”
Yes, from the corner.
“Keion takes a lot of the defenders,” Harvey said. “When they do, he can get it to me in the corner because I’m usually open. I like the corner. I have a good look (at the basket).”
He made a season-high five 3-pointers in a league victory over Burroughs this season.
And when an opposing power forward goes out to try and stop him?
“It opens the middle and he can get it to (6-7) Steven (Adams) or (6-6) Travis (Flye),” Tucker said. “We’re bigger than most teams.”
He also can find Bell cutting to the basket.
But before the start of the season, Tucker definitely had questions about his swingman.
“When he transferred in, we were a team with all these superstars,” he said. “He had to find a way to fit in and play, which he did. This season, he knew we had a lot of good players coming back and he had no assurances he would be starting.”
But Harvey joined Cameron Murray’s travel team during the summer and vastly improved, Tucker said. He even played in China.
“I wasn’t sure once until we got to games how he would do,” Tucker said. “He started slowly, but once he got going, I knew we’d be OK.
“He’s playing better, more comfortable and more confident. I knew he had a lot of potential. He’s smart and has a high IQ. He has really stepped up. He’s accomplished a lot this year and found his role.”
Harvey said right now all that counts is winning. He said it’s one reason why he decided to transfer to Pasadena.
“The difference is that it is a lot more serious here,” he said of the Bulldogs. “I told my dad (Lincoln) that I wanted to transfer here. He went here and this is the alma mater for a lot of his family.”
The winner of tonight’s game will advance to the quarterfinals with a match-up against Orange County schools Valencia or Fullerton.
“I think we had a tougher No. 3 seed than normal,” Tucker said. “We had a hard first-round game and Arroyo Valley is very good. They’ve played in every one of our tournaments. But I tell the kids you have to beat every team to win on paper.”