Tough early games lead to strong league run

Magnolia was 6-10 and on a four-game losing streak when Orange League play began in early January.

But the Sentinels remained confident.

"We were playing better teams from higher divisions," junior guard D'Shon Norris said. "We were competing with those teams, so we thought we could beat any team in our league."

Magnolia has beaten every team in the Orange League. The Sentinels come into this week with an 8-0 league record, and have clinched their first outright league championship since the 1997-98 season.

Norris scored seven points in the final 77 seconds of regulation in Magnolia's 52-48, double-overtime victory Friday over Savanna. He finished with 20 points, sort of a rarity on the balanced-scoring team.

Nathan Williams, the team's only senior starter, is averaging a team-high 12 points a game. Norris is averaging 10 points, as is Deshawn Henderson, a freshman. Sophomore Carlos Sanchez is averaging eight points.

"We like to control a game defensively," said Magnolia coach Mike Anderson, who also coaches the school's varsity girls basketball team. No league opponent has scored 50 points or more against the Sentinels, who are 14-10 overall and have only one senior starter, Williams.

"We just attack other teams with our defense, then try to get points out of transition," said Anderson, describing the team's press and trap defensive style and the fast break offense that often results.

Sanchez said the formula is simple.

"We just keep the ball in front of us," he said. "We play man-to-man, mostly, but if that's not working we'll go into a 1-2-2 zone and trap a lot, too. We try to speed up the game."

Williams, who draws a lot of double- and triple-teams from opposing teams, said the defense does produce scoring opportunities, but perhaps not enough of them.

"We sometimes have these droughts when we don't score for a long time," Williams said. "We need to get better at running our offense, and on making our free throws, too."

There is always room for improvement, sure. But Magnolia has been good enough to win a league championship.

THE PLAYOFFS

CIF-Southern Section seedings and first-round pairings will be released Sunday afternoon and will be available at ocvarsity.com.

There will be 12 playoff divisions, all with 32-team brackets. Teams get guaranteed playoff entry if they finish among the top two teams in four-team league, among the top three in five- and six-team leagues and among the top four in seven- and eight-team leagues. Teams that do not finish high enough in their standings for automatic entry can apply for at-large berths; there is no minimum-victories requirement for at-large consideration.

There could be some games added to Friday's regular-season schedule if leagues' third-place ties need to be settled.

There will be at-large berths in divisions in which there are fewer than 32 automatic qualifiers. Some divisions might have more than 32 automatic qualifiers; in these divisions, there will be wild-card round games played Feb. 17, on which first-round games will be played in other divisions. First-round games in some divisions and second-round games in others will be played Feb. 19.

Championship games are March 4, 5 and 6 at Honda Center, Colony High of Ontario and Mater Dei.

CIF-SS rankings, which can be found at ocvarsity.com, are important to the placement of teams in the brackets. Two county teams are No. 1 in their divisions: Mater Dei, in Division I-AA; and Ocean View, in III-AA. Foothill is No. 2 and Sonora is No. 4 in III-AA.

Other county teams that are high in their divisional rankings: Tarbut V'Torah, No. 2 in VI-AA, in which Orangewood Academy is No. 3 and Eastside Christian is No. 4; Edison is No. 3 and Canyon is No. 4 in II-AA; and Brethren Christian is No. 3 in V-A.

NOTES

Several players had high-scoring performances last week. Eric Avdee of Tarbut V'Torah averaged 25 points over three games for the Lions. Other top scorers for the week: Austin Loeb of Brethren Christian, averaged 23 points; Matt Glover of Tustin, 23 points; James Walker III of Los Alamtios, 23 points; Ben Kwan of University, 23 points, and teammate Christian Scott, 22 points; Tim Davis of El Modena, 21 points; Kashif Williams of Fairmont Prep, 21 points; Brendan Holmes of Marina, 21 points; KC Caudill of Brea Olinda, 21 points; and Sager Moritzky of St. Margaret's, 21 points.

Fifteen players on Ocean View's roster scored in the Seahawks' victory over Santa Ana in a Golden West League game. ... More than half of Sunny Hills' points came on 3-pointers in the Lancers' victory over Sonora last week. They made 10 3-pointers in a 57-53 victory, their second in as many Freeway League games against league-favorite Sonora.