Different teams have different personalities.
Mark Hill has had a variety of teams, and team personalities, in his 15 seasons as Esperanza’s boys basketball coach.
“This year’s team was a quiet group,” Hill said.
This year the Aztecs made a lot of noise, though. They were the only Orange County boys basketball team to win a CIF State championship.
For guiding the Aztecs to the top, Hill is the Register’s Orange County boys basketball coach of the year.
Esperanza finished the season with a 30-3 record and. The Aztecs went undefeated in the Crestview League. They were 25-1 at the end of the regular season and were selected to play in the elite Open Division of the CIF-SS playoffs.
The Aztecs took a 22-game winning streak into the playoffs. The streak was ended by Santa Margarita in the first round.
Esperanza was eliminated from the CIF-SS playoffs in its next game, a loss to Oak Park in the consolation bracket.
Then came another steak in the CIF Southern California Regionals.
The Aztecs beat Dorsey of Los Angeles, Bakersfield and Crossroads of Santa Monica to get to the regionals Division II championship game. They beat Pasadena in the final.
That put Esperanza in the CIF State Championships game. The Aztecs beat Moreau Catholic of Hayward, 72-65, to win the first state boys basketball title in Esperanza history.
Hill knew he had a good team when the Aztecs went to Chicago for a late-November, season-opening tournament. The Tournament of Champions featured Spartanburg Day of South Carolina and its nationally known junior star, Zion Williamson.
“I didn’t know exactly how we’d do against inner-city Chicago teams and some of the other great teams they had there,” Hill said. “I’d hoped we’d go 2-2 in the tournament, and was kind of afraid we might go 0-4.”
Esperanza went 3-1.
“And at point,” Hill said, “I thought we’d be pretty good.”
The players believed in Hill, said Eperanza star player Kezie Okpala.
“He has a lot of trust in his players and their abilities,” Okpala said.
Hill, whose 15 years as Esperanza’s coach is split over two stints, found this year’s team to be among the easier he has coached.
“It was a motivated group,” he said. “It wasn’t a group where I had to crack the whip at practice. Sometimes it’s a grind, but this team loved competing in practice every day.”
Hill shared the credit for Esperanza’s great year with his coaching staff of Craig Matthews, Chris Roberts and Dan Gardner.
And, of course, there were the players.
“These guys really did believe in themselves,” Hill said.
Maybe the coach had something to do with that, way back in November.
Did you see this?
Esperanza’s Kezie Okpala is the O.C. boys basketball player of the year