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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 ...

San Diego High had an unusual relationship with The San Diego Union. Student Alan McGrew, who also served in a business position as the “Temporary Football Manager of San Diego High School,” was the de facto Hilltoppers beat writer for the newspaper. McGrew filed daily reports on the Hilltoppers, the headline sports attraction in the city. He ...

Royce Freeman of Imperial scored 43 touchdowns and 258 points in 12 games to lead the San Diego Section for the third year in a row and finished sixth in the state, according to unofficial statistics provided by Max Preps. Freeman amassed 39 touchdowns and 3 two-point conversions for  240 points in 2011 and 36 touchdowns ...

St. Augustine is 10-0  and has a 24-game winning streak after a 65-49 victory over the host team in the first annual Rancho Santa Margarita Tournament today, climaxing a 4-game run through the Orange County event. The Saints beat Trabuco Hills, 62-61, Seattle Prep, 79-60,  and Alta of Sandy, Utah, 63-56, in earlier games.  Santa Margarita ...

La Jolla Country Day’s Jeff Hutzler, who stepped down recently, became the 37th coach in the San Diego Section to have a career total of at least 100 victories.  Jack Mashin of Grossmont recorded 125 victories in the Southern Section. Eleven active coaches have 100 or more (see complete list here): John Carroll (234-74-6, .755), Ron Hamamoto ...

The season’s first showdown came in the Horsman Invitational at  West Hills and the tournament championship and this week’s No. 1 ranking went to St. Augustine. Trey Kell fired from three-point range and, driving to the hoop, twisted around Torrey Pines defenders to score 28 points and lead the Saints to a 60-55 victory in a ...

That Tyler Gaffney led Cathedral to a State championship and scored a record 56 touchdowns in 14 games only reinforced the notion that this was a year of the running back. Thirty-one San Diego Section players rushed for at least 1,000 yards and none were more productive than Gaffney, Escondido’s Ricky Seale, and Madison’s Robbie Rouse. NORTH-SOUTH ...