Frank Burlison

RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA, Ca. – Even a piece of the Trinity League champion is well out of its reach with two league games left to play.

But the Santa Margarita High boys’ basketball team delivered a succinct message Wednesday night that it’s going to be quite a handful to deal with for any CIF Southern Section playoff opponent – including the Open Division.

Coach Jeff Reinert’s program took an important step toward a third consecutive spot in the SS Open Division playoff bracket with their 81-63 Trinity League victory over visiting St.

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LAKEWOOD, Ca. – “Order”, if you will, was restored in the Moore Leagues boys’ basketball race Tuesday night at Lakewood High.

The Long Beach Poly Jackrabbits, stunned at home (90-87, OT) when the teams met on Jan. 8, took resounding control of the league-lead Monday night with a 73-54 victory over the host Lancers.

Coach Shelton Diggs’ club improved to 15-6 and 7-1 in league, with Moore games yet to play this week with Wilson (Wednesday) and Millikan (Friday).

The Jackrabbits go outside of league for the final time in the regular season on Saturday afternoon at Mater Dei High, when they face Sierra Canyon at 4:15 in the two-day, 23^rd Nike Extravaganza.

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NORWALK – The tenth State Preview Saturday – now under the guidance of Rolling Hills Prep since Coach Harvey Kitani moved there from Fairfax High – gave a decent not-so-sneaky preview of some of the programs likely to make deep runs into the 2018 California State Championship Tournament.

The most notable those among the 16 teams on display at Cerritos College was, of course, defending State and Southern Section Open Division Champion Bishop Montgomery.

And nothing occurred during the Knights’ 60-43 takedown of L.A. City power Fairfax to even mildly begin to offer any doubt that Coach Doug Mitchell’s club is an iron-clad favorite to successful defend both of those crowns in March.

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DOWNEY – PMA Matchup Day II is set for Saturday at St. Pius-St. Mathias High in Downey.

Six boys’ basketball games will be played, beginning with the noon clash between the host school and Monroe and ending with the 7 o’clock contest pitting Serra and Fairmont Prep.

In a coupling of intriguing games, St. John Bosco faces Blair (coached by SJM alum Jelani Gardner) at 3 and JSerra takes on Cantwell-Sacred Heart at 6.

 

Complete schedule:

Noon, Monroe vs. St. Pius X-St. Matthias; 1:30 p.m.,

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LYNWOOD – The host Lynwood High Knights knocked off the Warren Bears, 68-62, in a Friday night showdown for a piece of first place in the San Gabriel Valley.

And Coach Jason Crowe’s Knights were able to avenge a Jan. 10 loss to Warren (70-63) although the Bears held Lynwood’s best players to seven points below the SGVL scoring average he took into Friday’s game.

Of course, 6-foot-9, 250-pound (give or take) junior Carl Lewis took a 45.0 ppg average over the team’s first five league games prior to the rematch with the Bears.

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