Taking a look around Orange County high school sports:
• A few county teams are winners of the the CIF-Southern Section/Ford Academic Awards for this school year. The teams that had the highest cumulative grade-point averages for their sports in the 575-school Southern Section are: Newport Harbor, large-school girls cross country, 3.89 GPA; Corona del Mar, large-school football, 3.35; and San Juan Hills, large-school girls golf, 3.88.
• The Women’s Southern California Golf Association annually awards scholarship grants to top academic girls golf teams in the Southern Section. County teams that won WSCGA grants are Beckman and San Juan Hills.
• WSCGA and CIF-SS team academics winners will be honored during pregame activities April 29 at Angel Stadium before the Cleveland-Angels game.
• The All-Orange County boys basketball team is published April 18 online at ocvarsity.com, in the Register OC Varsity print section April 19. We are going with six teams of five players each. Some of the teams will appear in print, the entirety at ocvarsity.com.
• Selecting county boys basketball player of the year was easy. Choosing a county coach of the year was more difficult. We came down to these four finalists (in alphabetical order): Bret Fleming, Laguna Beach; Nate Harrison, Canyon; Gary McKnight, Mater Dei; Jeff Reinert, Santa Margarita.
• Of course, there are several others who deserved consideration for county boys basketball coach of the year. The quality of coaching in county basketball is better than it’s ever been. Some county boys basketball parents will dispute that, but it’s true.
• The Orange County All-Star Basketball Games are Saturday at Concordia University. The girls game is at 5p.m., the boys game at 7p.m. Admission is $10 for adults, free for students (including college students) and children.
• Garrett Corcoran of Villa Park has the best times in California in boys track and field in the 1,600 and 3,200 meters. He ran a 4:08.83 at the APU/adidas Distance last month. His 3,200 – 8 minutes, 58.01 seconds – was posted at the Irvine Invitational last month.
• Curtis Godin of Mater Dei has the fastest 100 time in state boys track and field, at 10.42. His 21.18 is the fastest 200 time in the state. Gabe Warner of Woodbridge is No.5 in the state in the 200 at 21.78.
• Orange Luthean’s Carl Johansson still has the best pole vault mark in the state, at 16 feet, 71/2 inches in a dual meet last month against Mater Dei.
• Her dead-heat finish against Simi Valley star distance runner Sarah Baxter a couple of weeks ago still has Northwood’s Bethan Knights tied with Baxter for fastest 3,200 time in California at 10:07.52.
• Santa Margarita’s Kaitlyn Merritt, as expected, is on top of the pole vault list at 13-9. And climbing. She has the third-best mark in the nation.
• There will be at-large berths available for the CIF-SS playoffs, including baseball and softball. In baseball and softball, wild-card round games will be for teams that did not fit into the 32-team divisional draw. Baseball, softball, tennis and volleyball teams need to have .500 or better overall records to be considered for at-large berths.
• The CIF-SS office will send its recommendations for playoff groupings for the 2014-15 and 2015-16 school years to league representatives May20. The section’s playoff groupings committee on May28 will hear appeals from leagues dissatisfied with their divisional placing. Final vote on playoff groupings will occur at the CIF-SS Coucil meeting June10.
• Football playoff groupings always are interesting. From an Orange County perspective, three football leagues could come into play: the South Coast League, which might exit the Pac-5 Division; the Sunset League, which has been abundantly successful in the Southwest Division; and the Pacific Coast League, which has been the power in the Southern Division.
• Because of the lockdown at Tustin High on Thursday, the Cypress-Tustin baseball game scheduled for that day has been rescheduled for today.
• Mission Viejo’s softball team is No.1 in studentsports.com’s national rankings. The Diablos are also No.1 in CalHiSports.com’s California top 20.
• Other county teams in the state top 20: Esperanza at No.4; Pacifica, No.6; Yorba Linda, No.13; Mater Dei, No.15; and Los Alamitos, No.18.
• Mater Dei’s boys basketball team finished at No.1 on maxpreps.com final national rankings, making the Monarchs national champions in that website’s conclusion.
• Mater Dei’s Trinity League football game against St. John Bosco this fall, the league opener Oct.10, will be a Bosco home game for the second year in a row. Usually, teams switch home-team status from one year to the next. Because the Trinity League enters a new five-year scheduling cycle for the 2014 season, Bosco is the home team against Mater Dei again.
• Mater Dei football has an abundance of nonleague away games in ’14, including a trip to Westlake of Westlake Village. The Monarchs do conclude the regular season with three consecutive league home games.
• JSerra’s league football home game against Bosco on Oct.16 is at San Juan Hills, because of a scheduling conflict at JSerra’s usual home site, Saddleback College. All other JSerra football home games are at Saddleback College.
• Orange Lutheran will have its Air Force-OLu Healing Heroes Football game May10. The camp is for boys and girls in grades K-8. All proceeds for the camp (cost is $20 in advance, $30 day of camp) go to the Healing Heroes Ministry. For information call Barb Olson at 714-998-5151, ext. 691.
Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com
