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How uncommon is this? When Kearny (23-2) meets Sweetwater (28-0) Friday afternoon the teams will be coached by alumni of their respective schools. At stake will be the San Diego Section Division IV championship. Historian Greg (Stats) Durrant came up with this and other nuggets as the veteran prep sports maven prepared to take in five boys’ and ...

There are 20.8 seconds remaining in the game.  Your team trails, 57-54, after battling back from down 14. A blocking foul is whistled on one of your players. The frustration finally got to Foothills Christian coach Brad Leaf. Leaf channeled his inner Jim Boeheim and was slapped with a technical. The Knights mentor’s outburst at the officials differed from ...

There will be basketball almost every night this week in the San Diego Section. Girls begin quarterfinals play in Divisions II, III, and IV tonight and  Tuesday night.  Boys tip Tuesday night in II, III, and IV. Open semifinals are Tuesday and Wednesday and finals  Saturday at the Jenny Craig Pavilion on the University of San Diego ...

St. Augustine is top-ranked in the final UT-San Diego regular-season poll and is the defending state champion in Division III as playoff teams enter the homestretch of the season. Coach Mike Haupt’s team,  29-4 a year ago, take a 26-2 record into this season’s playoffs and are ranked 18th in the state by Cal-Hi Sports. St. Augustine finished 10th overall ...

Seventeen teams with losing records and three .500 squads  made the San Diego Section playoffs. It doesn’t look as ridiculous as in previous years. Pairings announced Saturday promise good games, even  in early rounds, especially considering size of brackets and number of divisions. Only in Division II is there virtual mediocrity. Seven of the eight, first-round visiting clubs ...

San Diego County was “free” of the giant Southern Section and on its own, twenty-eight schools strong. The formation of the local CIF section pleased administrators and assorted education honchos who wielded the sharp end of the stick. Coaches and most fans were ambivalent. The great competition against Northern schools and the building excitement of playoffs at foreign ...

Selection Saturday is just five days away. League play wraps up this week, but all eyes are on the postseason and the ensuing rounds that lead to the state championships in Sacramento next month. Seedings and pairings for the San Diego Section playoffs, to be waged in 5 divisions,  will come out of  Section commissioner Jerry Schniepp’s ...

The 12-0 season, Southern California championship, and declaration as national champions was just the beginning for coach Clarence (Nibs) Price and many of the San Diego High Hilltoppers. Price left the school after the 1917-18 school year and made his way back to Price’s alma mater, the University of California at Berkeley, joining the staff of head coach ...

Walt Harvey, whose firm and folksy touch resonated with generations of San Diego-area athletes and future coaches, passed away Feb. 7 at age 95. A memorial will be held at noon Saturday, Feb. 22, at La Vida Real, where Harvey resided the last several years. La Vida Real is located at 11588 Via Rancho San Diego, El ...

It was a moot point for 97 years. But when Bakersfield defeated Loomis Del Oro, 56-26, in the State Division I championship  this season an old dispute surfaced. Officially the title was Bakersfield’s seventh, along with years of 1920, ’21, ’22, ’23, ’25, and ’27. State championships were not played from 1928-2005. Bakersfield historians claim the win over ...

Follow the 12-0 San Diego High team, which won the Southern California title and was declared No. 1 in the U.S. by the National Sports News Service, as covered by Jack Darroch, “beat writer” for The San Diego Union who was a student at the school or recent graduate. Darroch’s view took in the inner workings ...

Echoes of Gary Zarecky’s fast-breaking teams of the 1980’s are being heard at Sweetwater, where the Runnin’ Red Devils now are 16-0 and inching higher in the UT-San Diego weekly poll. An 82-66 victory over Morse last week was preceded by five games in which coach Jesse Aguirre’s team scored at least 90 points and 100 ...

The Martin Luther King Day doubleheader at Francis Parker produced the best game of the season, St. Augustine’s 79-74 victory over La Costa Canyon, and the Saints are unanimous choices as San Diego’s top team in the UT-San Diego poll. Trey Kell was brilliant for the winners and scored  37 points, but the tough Mavericks hounded ...

The University of Oklahoma was quick to notice that Randall, Baxter, and Seale weren’t the only San Diego Section football stars with exclamation points next to their names. Running back Brennan Clay (Scripps Ranch), wide receiver Kenny Stills, Jr. (La Costa Canyon), and free safety Tony Jefferson (Eastlake) all took their diplomas and moved to where the ...

Deon Randall, his jersey in tatters and his high school career at an end, walked off the Carson Home Depot Field. “It’s a great parallel,” Randall said, “a great analogy, a great symbol to how the game went…it was a rough game.” Randall was a warrior in the State Small Schools Bowl.  He rushed for 276 yards ...

Lincoln could have used Norman Powell last night at St. Augustine, but Powell is busy rising  at UCLA under first-year coach Steve Alford. It should have been expected. There’s a connection between Powell and Alford. That was apparent three years ago at a Lincoln-St. Augustine game in the Saints’ old Daugherty Gym. The date, Feb. 15, 2011. Alford, then ...

Amid the flourishing mid-season “shootouts” is Point Loma High, among the increasing number of schools hosting all-day, nonleague “showcase” games. The contests don’t always turn out to be showcases, because games often have to be scheduled a year in advance and teams’ fortunes change, ebbing and flowing for myriad reasons. The Pointers call their  annual event Saturday, ...

No state champions, but there were four San Diego Section teams in Cal-Hi Sports‘ final, overall top 25. San Diego tied for second with the Sac-Joaquin Section in number of top 25 squads from the 10 state sections. Mission Hills (11-2) was 11th,  Oceanside (10-3) 13th.  St. Augustine and Cathedral, each 11-2, were 24th and 25th, respectively. The ...

Rumblings out of the South Bay have become a roar. Mater Dei Catholic and Sweetwater barged into the upper half of the ratings in the U-T San Diego poll this week. Mater Dei, a 26-7 squad and Southern California Division  IV regional semifinalist in 2012-13, is no surprise, posting a 12-2 record and losing only to San ...

St. Augustine saw an 18-point lead in the third quarter dwindle to 4 but finally put away La Verne Damien, 73-63, as a full house of about 800 persons nervously looked on at St. Augustine Saturday night. Trey Kell had 22 points for the winners but it was six free throws in the final 38.7 seconds by ...