Mater Dei’s boys basketball team lost to the No. 2 team in the nation by 19 points.
The Monarchs play the No. 1 team in the nation tonight, a team that has scored in triple figures 15 times and has won its two playoff games by 34 and 44 points.
Mater Dei plays Chino Hills today at 7 p.m. in a CIF-SS Open Division semifinal. The game is at Ayala High of Chino Hills, which has a seating capacity of around 2,000. Chino Hills’ gym can seat roughly 1,300.
Chino Hills’ best player is probably the best player in California, Lonzo Ball. A 6-foot-6 senior who can score any way possible, Ball signed with UCLA.
Two younger Ball brothers are on the team as is a cousin. LiAngelo Ball, a 6-6 junior, committed to UCLA. LaMelo Ball is a 5-10 freshman who is an excellent shooter and played with calm confidence in the Nike Extravaganza at Mater Dei earlier this month when the Huskies beat Bishop Gorman of Las Vegas.
The cousin is Andre Ball, a 6-5 sophomore.
It will be a challenge for Mater Dei, ranked No. 4 in California. And it’s one that has the Monarchs excited.
“It’s not every year you get to play the No. 1 and No. 2 team (Oak Hill Academy of Virginia) in the country,” said Mater Dei coach Gary McKnight, who has coached against Nos. 1 and 2 teams before, and has had a few teams ranked that high. “Games like this are why kids come to Mater Dei.”
Kids like Spencer Freedman, a sophomore point guard who transferred from Santa Monica. Freedman has been particularly excellent these past few weeks.
He is looking forward to the Chino Hills challenge, too.
“We can’t come out nervous,” said Freedman, who scored 13 points with five assists Tuesday in Mater Dei’s 61-46 win over Centennial of Corona.
“The feeling in the locker room and among the coaches,” Freedman added, “is that we can play with anyone.”
That’s not just anyone that Mater Dei will be playing.
Taking a look around Orange County high school sports:
• Mater Dei will sell its remaining allotment of tickets for the Chino Hills game today starting at 10 a.m. School athletic director Phil Bellomo said Mater Dei will have roughly 100 adult tickets ($10 each) and 50 student and child tickets ($5) on sale at an on-campus location.
• Open Division girls basketball teams that went 0-2 in the playoffs, and thus were eliminated from the CIF-SS playoffs, will play in the CIF Southern California Regionals that begin March 9. That’s quite a time gap for teams that were eliminated Tuesday – 15 days between games. Eliminated Open Division teams can stay sharp by playing a scrimmage next week, but it can’t be against another Open Division team.
• All-league and All-County winter sports teams will be published after those sports’ seasons have been concluded.
• Laguna Beach had 14 girls in its girls basketball program this season. The Breakers still went 20-8 and were Orange Coast League co-champions with Estancia.
• Fountain Valley will announce the hiring of its football coach early next week. Athletic director Steve Eggert said the five finalists for the job are currently head coaches. The Barons’ coach this past season, Ray Fenton, left to become the coach at Los Alamitos.
• Trabuco Hills is close to naming its new football coach. Joe Silvey resigned after one season.
• Gabby Garcia of Valencia will try to become the first four-time state champion in the history of California girls wrestling at the CIF State girls wrestling championships in Visalia. The event begins today and concludes Saturday.
• The Register’s baseball and softball previews will be published early next week.
• Baseball’s Loara Tournament begins Thursday. Schedules are at ocvarsity.com and at loara.usapremiersports.com. Results and schedule updates will also be posted as they become available.
• There are several teams in the 32-team Loara Tournament that are being considered for the county preseason top 10: Aliso Niguel, Cypress, Dana Hills, Edison, El Dorado, El Toro, Fountain Valley, Los Alamitos, San Clemente and Santa Margarita. Also in the tournament are Long Beach Millikan, which is No. 6 in the CIF-SS Division 1 preseason rankings, and Bishop Amat of La Puente, No. 4 in Division 3.
• Also leading off the baseball season, as usual, is the Newport Elks Tournament, which has 78 teams spread over four divisions. Its top division, the Frank Lerner Division, has 16 teams and includes O.C. top 10 candidates Capistrano Valley, Esperanza, Foothill, JSerra, Orange Lutheran, Tesoro and Tustin.
• Huntington Beach, the No. 1 baseball team in a few national rankings, will not play in the Loara and Newport Elks tournaments. CIF-SS rules limit baseball teams to two tournaments per season. Huntington Beach will play in the Boras Classic locally and in the National High School Invitational in North Carolina.
• The Orange County Athletic Directors Association honored “Student-Athletes of Character” on Monday at Anaheim Convention Center. The list of honorees is at ocvarsity.com.
• The featured speaker at the OCADA event was CIF-SS commissioner Rob Wigod who mentioned that his father is a doctor as was Wigod’s grandfather. Rob Wigod is something of a doctor, too. He regularly deals with sick parents.
Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com
