Three-star junior
Zachary White also came up big in the win, finishing with 23 points for the Knights.
Notre Dame shot 16 of 19 from the free throw line in the fourth quarter and was 24 of 31 from the charity stripe in the contest to spark the win.
Harvard-Westlake led 18-16 at the end of the first quarter before falling behind 33-29 at the half. Notre Dame maintained a 47-43 lead after three quarters of play.
Top-ranked junior prospect Tyran Stokes scored a team-high 24 points and thew down an exclamation slam dunk in the closing seconds as No. 24 Notre Dame beat No. 2 Harvard-Westlake 68-61 on Friday. The Knights advance to the finals of the Southern Section Open Division finals for the first time in program history. (FILE PHOTO: Louis Lopez)
Although the Wolverines knotted things up at 51 with five minutes to go in the fourth quarter, Notre Dame ran away with a 7-0 run that culminated with a White dunk and a 58-51 edge with 3:24 remaining.
Harvard-Westlake had won the previous three meetings between the league foes — including a 73-63 triumph on Jan. 24 and a 67-64 victory in the Mission League tournament championship game on Feb. 5.
The Knights closed out pool play 4-0 and advance to the Open Division Southern Section title game for the
first time in program history. They take on the Tuesday's winner between No. 5
Roosevelt (Eastvale) and
St. John Bosco (Bellflower) on March 1.
Although Harvard-Westlake drops to 29-2 on the season, the two-time defending state champions still have an opportunity to defend their crown next month in the Southern California Open Division bracket. Five-star Duke signee
Nikolas Khamenia scored a game-high 31 points in the loss.
The Wolverines are now 120-10 in their past 130 games with three of those losses coming against Notre Dame.
