SACRAMENTO – The final half of the six California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) boys’ basketball championship games will be played in the Sleep Train Arena Saturday.
And action wraps up at 8 p.m. with the headliner of the Thursday-Saturday 12-game (girls included) schedule, the Open Division championship game pitting Southern representative Chino Hills and its Northern counterpart, Concord De La Salle.
The De La Salle is 31-2 in A.J. Kuhle’s first season as the head coach at his alma mater (Class of 2000), with only losses to Las Vegas Bishop Gorman (in a second-round, Dec. 28 game in the Open Division of the MaxPreps Holiday Classic) and to Southern California’s Corona Centennial (in the Feb. 6 Nike Extravaganza at Santa Ana Mater Dei).
So why are the Spartans a consensus and considerable underdog in the championship game?
It’s because they will be trying to do what 34 other opponents – including some of the very best that California has to offer – couldn’t do.
In no particular order those are, keep from turning the ball over against the Huskies’ defensive pressure; hamper the line of sight of their jump shooters; keep them from crunching the offensive glass with second and third shot attempts; and keep point guard Lonzo Ball pushing the basketball down their figurative throats.
With all those things as such key elements, I suppose it’s not really that surprising that Chino Hills will take a 34-0 and unanimous No. 1 national ranking into the game.
The 6-foot-5, UCLA-bound Ball directs an offense that averages 99 points per game and has hit the century mark a state record-tying 18 times.
And he just one member of a gifted starting lineup that includes his younger brothers LiAngelo (a 6-5 junior) and LaMelo (a 5-10 freshman), as well as two fellows Lonzo also refers to as “our brothers” in 6-5 junior Elizjah Scott and 6-9 freshman Onyeka Okongwu.
Coach Steve Baik’s team has dominated its playoff competition in a manner that is unprecedented as long as I’ve been following and writing about California high school hoops.
And that’s been a really long time, in case you’re wondering – way back when in the early 1970s! I’m old!
Enough of my self-deprecation and back to the Chino Hills-De La Salle game. . .
The Huskies have knocked off sectional and regional opponents by an average margin of 30.2 points. Among those opponents are Mater Dei, Chatsworth Sierra Canyon, El Cajon Foothills Christian and Torrance Bishop Montgomery – all among the seven or eight best teams in the Western portion of the U.S. of A.
But the De La Salle coaching staff and players, I’m sure, haven’t let those gaudy numbers dissuade them as they prepared for Saturday night’s challenge.
Kuhle is an exceptional coach and he’s got a couple of terrific senior guards in Jordan Ratinho and Nikhil Peters who match up well, size-wise, with the bigger of the Ball brothers.
And 6-6, 230-pound junior Emeka Udenyi is not only quite imposing, strength-wise, but he also has a lot of skill from the perimeter as well as in the low post.
Regardless of the outcome, though, it should prove compelling viewing as has been the case 34 other times with Chino Hills.
The other two boys game on tap Saturday feature Southern representative Studio City Harvard-Westlake (26-8) against Salinas Palma (26-4) at noon for the Division IV title and Northern squad San Mateo Serra (25-5) vs. Long Beach Poly (24-10) in the Division II final at 4 p.m.
Harvard-Westlake has a very good senior point guard in Wolfgang Novogratz and one of California’s most spectacular young athletes in 6-5 freshman Cassius Stanley, who throws fast balls (he’s been clocked in the low 90s) as impressively as he dunks (hit YouTube for proof).
Palma has a quality junior guard in Jamaree Bouyea and a skilled 6-8 post in Wyatt Maker.
Poly, which last won a state title 32 years ago, has a University of Hawaii-bound guard in Drew Buggs and a formidable post presence in 6-6 junior Zafir Williams.
Serra is led by a versatile 6-5 senior in Jake Killingsworth, who fits the “student-athlete” moniker quite well: He’s going to be a freshman at Ivy League member Columbia in the fall.
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