Burlison on Basketball

Frank Burlison | High School Basketball | College Basketball

La Mirada has to take “wait and see” approach to its playoff landing spot

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LA MIRADA – So now, the La Mirada High Matadores wait until Saturday at noon – as does every other CIF Southern Section boys’ basketball team that has qualified for the playoffs.

Coach Randy Oronoz’s team rolled past visiting and short-handed Mayfair, without much fuss or muss, 87-51, Wednesday night to complete its Gateway League schedule unbeaten and regular season at 24-4.

But the waiting – until the CIF SS office in Los Alamitos announced all the divisional playoffs’ brackets (or, for the Open Division, pool play seeding) Saturday – is the hardest part for Oronoz and his players.

Will the Matadores been a part of the of the Open field for the first time in the division’s 11-year history?

Or will they land a pretty cool “consolation prize” as the No. 1 seed in the Division I bracket?

They made it clear, before and after the win on one of the most elaborate “Seniors Night” celebrations I’ve witnessed, where they stand.

“It’s out of our hands,” Oronoz conceded, after his eight seniors had been honored following the game with a lot of the La Mirada crowd sticking around to watch video of the players and hear Oronoz praise each elaborately, in person and in a video presentation.

“But we want to be in the Open – that has been the goal since the season started,” he said.

One of those seniors – and one of the two or three best players in the program’s history – agreed.

“Getting to the Open has been my goal since I got here,” University of Texas/Rio Grande Valley-bound guard Julien Gomez said, 20 minutes before the tip-off of a game in which he scored 22 points, as did terrific sophomore teammate Gene Roebuck.

The left hander – whose on-court skill is a nice definition of “savvy” – is more than hip enough to the Southland hoops landscape to understand that the Matadores’ path to a CIF SS title would be much more accommodating in Division I than in the Open.

“But,” he said, recalling his team’s loss to Rancho Christian in a CIF SS title game in his sophomore season as well as its upset loss to St. Bernard, as the No. 3 seed in D-I, in the second-round last year, “we want to be in the Open.”

And a compelling case can be made for his team’s Open inclusion, be it in the traditional eight-team, pool-play format or a 10-team field in the same format – well beyond the 24-4 record and average winning margin of 35.3 points while going unbeaten in eight league games.

They’ve got a win over another strong Open candidate (Redondo Union, in the Dec. 27, second round of the Platinum Division of the Classic at Damien), as well as a pair of wins against Baseline League champion Rancho Cucamonga, which is likely to draw a 4 to 6 seed in the D-I playoff bracket.

Their only losses came against Trinity League co-champion and 3 or 4 Open seed St. John Bosco – twice – and to quality teams from Illinois and Arizona.

But their dropping from No. 5 to 8 in the updated computer ratings Monday – despite pounding Dominguez by 48 points in a league game in the previous week – tells a harsh tale:

A strong component in the computer ratings (that the CIF SS is using for the first time to shape its basketball playoff divisions) is strength of schedule.

And playing eight Gateway League foes took a big bit out of the value of the strong non-league slate Oronoz scheduled– notably slots in the best pre-Christmas (St. John Bosco) and post-Christmas (Classic at Damien) tournaments in the state.

Mayfair (22-6 and 7-1) – which played without its best player Wednesday night, junior guard Josiah Johnson (ankle sprain) – is clearly the second-best team in the league.

But the Monsoons, whose two losses to La Mirada were by a margin of 31.5 ppg, were No. 63 in the CIF SS computer pecking order that was updated on Monday afternoon.

And the other three programs were even deeper into the ratings: Gahr (157), Dominguez (162) and Lynwood (189).

So, are the wins over Gahr and the Monsoons this week enough to keep the Matadores at No. 8 in the update of the ratings that the CIF SS office will use to put together the playoff divisions?

It’s dicey, especially when the team that was No. 9 Monday – Notre Dame of Sherman Oaks – trailed the Matadores by .033 percentage points (3.178 to 3.145), and knocked off No. 6 Sierra Canyon, on its home court, and lost by just three points to No. 1 Harvard-Westlake in the Mission League tourney.

Those results figure to move the Knights into No. 5 or 6.

So, Coach Oronoz’s crew’s smoothest path to the Open playoffs could be if the SS office decides to expand the Open to 10 teams.

There isn’t a lot of mystery where the Mayfair Monsoons will find themselves when the divisions are announced on Saturday.

Being at 63 Monday meant that they were Division 2AA-bound with the top eight (or 10) making up the Open field, and the next 32 going into Division 1.

And it’s a division in which the Monsoons could enjoy significant success in Donnell Meekins’ first season as the program’s coach – especially if Johnson is healthy.

The 6-foot-3 Johnson – who attended Orangewood Academy in Garden Grove last season and whose parents played basketball at Long Beach State – suffered a sprained ankle in practice Tuesday, said Meekins, and was held out Wednesday.

Johnson – who drew raves from Oronoz about how well he played against the Matadores on Jan. 17 – is one of the top point-guard prospects among Southern California juniors.

Wednesday night Meekins started a junior Matthew Gibbs-Martinez (a transfer from Lynwood who scored 15 points) and one of SoCal’s underrated freshmen, Amon Boykin (eight points and six rebounds Wednesday).

And the long-term future – next season – is bright, too.

Joining the Monsoons will be Donnell Meekins, Jr. – one of the region’s best eighth graders.

*Re: The Mission League tourney final Wednesday night in Studio City, won by the host Wolverines, 67-64.

Their closest brush with defeat (they trailed by two points with a little more than a minute go) against a California opponent this season was their 18th consecutive win.

It tightened the 27-1 Wolverines’ grip on the top seed in the Open field over No. 2 Roosevelt.

But, even with the loss, Notre Dame’s Open positioning – coupled with the Knights’ win at No. 6 Sierra Canyon the night before – was enhanced.

Don’t be surprised if Matt Sargeant’s team climbs from the No. 9 it entered the week to 5 when the Open field is unveiled Saturday.

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