Here's Jack Nelson's discussion of the CIF-SS Open Division quarterfinal results and what to expect in the semifinals:
Everything went according to Hoyle as the 4 top seeds in the CIF-SS Open Div quarterfinal games all won their games to advance to the Semi-Finals at the Galen Center on the USC Campus on Friday night.
#1 seeded Sierra Canyon will play the opening 7 PM game vs. #4 seeded Bishop Montgomery and in the nitecap it will be #2 seeded and defending CIF SS Open Div champion Chino Hills taking on #3 seeded Mater Dei.
Mater Dei’s only loss was to Chino Hills in the championship of the pre Christmas Jerry Tarkanian Classic in Las Vegas. Since that time, Mater Dei picked up 7-2 Bol Bol, son of the late former great NBA star Manute Bol, who was declared eligible for the second semester.
As I mentioned earlier when the brackets for this open Div came out 9 days ago that if these top 4 seeds survived the first two rounds without an upset that this is most likely the strongest semifinals ever held in a non invitational high school tournament.
These 4 schools are all ranked in the top 10 in the nation by MaxPreps.com. Sierra Canyon is #2, Chino Hills #3, Mater Dei #5 and Bishop Montgomery #9. This is why the CIF decided to move both semifinal games to the same venue so fans could get to watch both games.
These teams feature some of the greatest stars in the game beginning with Sierra Canyon’s 6-9 Jr. Marvin Bagley III and 6-8 Sr. Cody Riley, a UCLA commit. Bagley III is the #1 player in the class of 2018.
Chino Hills still has 2 Ball brothers and they have been putting up some big numbers on the board. 6-5 Sr. LiAngelo Ball has dropped as many as 76 points in a game while his younger brother LaMelo Ball dropped 92 last week on Los Osos.
Gelo has already signed with UCLA and Melo has been offered there also. Huskie forward Eli Scott is a good one and signed with Loyola Marymount, and 6-9 Soph Onyeka Okongwu may be the greatest of all.
In tonight's game against Long Beach Poly when Melo was held scoreless in the first half, Okongwu took over the load in the opening half and ended up being the leading scorer for the Huskies as he had 29 points, including 3 treys and 16 rebounds and 5 blocks.
Melo got his shooting eye back in the 2nd half when he scored 26 points, 21 of those in the fourth quarter. When he gets hot, he really gets hot and can fire them up from all parts of the court.
Mater Dei now has the big giant Bol Bol on its roster and he not only is big, he is very agile and has great instincts for blocking and altering shots. This game should be a crowd pleaser from start to finish.
I am sure there will be a lot of coverage about this game on TV and in the newspapers but these teams are very capable of living up to their "Hype."
What should be mentioned is that this tourney will not end any team’s hope of winning the state championship because all four finalists will be entered in the Southern Calif regionals, which will be an 8 team tourney to see who comes out of it as champion of the south and go up to Sacramento and play the Northern Calif champs for the overall state open Div title.
These 4 teams will be joined by 2 teams from the LA City Section, one team from the San Diego Section, and one from Bakersfield/Fresno.
The opener and the semifinals will be played at the host schools and the Southern Regional Open Div final will be played at the Pyramid in Long Beach on March 18th at 8pm.
Everything went according to Hoyle as the 4 top seeds in the CIF-SS Open Div quarterfinal games all won their games to advance to the Semi-Finals at the Galen Center on the USC Campus on Friday night.
#1 seeded Sierra Canyon will play the opening 7 PM game vs. #4 seeded Bishop Montgomery and in the nitecap it will be #2 seeded and defending CIF SS Open Div champion Chino Hills taking on #3 seeded Mater Dei.
Mater Dei’s only loss was to Chino Hills in the championship of the pre Christmas Jerry Tarkanian Classic in Las Vegas. Since that time, Mater Dei picked up 7-2 Bol Bol, son of the late former great NBA star Manute Bol, who was declared eligible for the second semester.
As I mentioned earlier when the brackets for this open Div came out 9 days ago that if these top 4 seeds survived the first two rounds without an upset that this is most likely the strongest semifinals ever held in a non invitational high school tournament.
These 4 schools are all ranked in the top 10 in the nation by MaxPreps.com. Sierra Canyon is #2, Chino Hills #3, Mater Dei #5 and Bishop Montgomery #9. This is why the CIF decided to move both semifinal games to the same venue so fans could get to watch both games.
These teams feature some of the greatest stars in the game beginning with Sierra Canyon’s 6-9 Jr. Marvin Bagley III and 6-8 Sr. Cody Riley, a UCLA commit. Bagley III is the #1 player in the class of 2018.
Chino Hills still has 2 Ball brothers and they have been putting up some big numbers on the board. 6-5 Sr. LiAngelo Ball has dropped as many as 76 points in a game while his younger brother LaMelo Ball dropped 92 last week on Los Osos.
Gelo has already signed with UCLA and Melo has been offered there also. Huskie forward Eli Scott is a good one and signed with Loyola Marymount, and 6-9 Soph Onyeka Okongwu may be the greatest of all.
In tonight's game against Long Beach Poly when Melo was held scoreless in the first half, Okongwu took over the load in the opening half and ended up being the leading scorer for the Huskies as he had 29 points, including 3 treys and 16 rebounds and 5 blocks.
Melo got his shooting eye back in the 2nd half when he scored 26 points, 21 of those in the fourth quarter. When he gets hot, he really gets hot and can fire them up from all parts of the court.
Mater Dei now has the big giant Bol Bol on its roster and he not only is big, he is very agile and has great instincts for blocking and altering shots. This game should be a crowd pleaser from start to finish.
I am sure there will be a lot of coverage about this game on TV and in the newspapers but these teams are very capable of living up to their "Hype."
What should be mentioned is that this tourney will not end any team’s hope of winning the state championship because all four finalists will be entered in the Southern Calif regionals, which will be an 8 team tourney to see who comes out of it as champion of the south and go up to Sacramento and play the Northern Calif champs for the overall state open Div title.
These 4 teams will be joined by 2 teams from the LA City Section, one team from the San Diego Section, and one from Bakersfield/Fresno.
The opener and the semifinals will be played at the host schools and the Southern Regional Open Div final will be played at the Pyramid in Long Beach on March 18th at 8pm.
