No one scored more than 10 points in a game against George Taylor, whose defensive commitment and offensive playmaking earned the 6-foot San Diego High guard City Prep League player-of-the-year honors in the 1953-54 season.
Taylor taught many years at Los Angeles’ Locke High.
Taylor, who passed in San Diego on Jan. 27 at age 80, was the primary player on the 22-5 team that reached the quarterfinals of CIF Southern Section major playoffs.
Taylor scored 273 points in 27 games, leading the Cavers to a 12-2 league record and an upset, 68-56 victory over favored Alhambra in the playoffs’ first round.
Taylor went on to star in basketball and earn a degree at Pepperdine University in Los Angeles. He was an educator for many years in the Los Angeles area and later earned his PHD at Claremont College.
Taylor eventually returned to San Diego and became a board member at the William J. Oakes Boys’ Club in Logan Heights, where Taylor first took up basketball, under the guidance of legendary coach Augie Escamilla.
San Diego coach Merrill Douglas prepped for playoffs with Alfred Hudson and George Taylor (from left).
2016-17 Week 6: St. Augustine Alone at Top
The speed bump Foothills Christian hit against Orange Glen last week was followed by a chassis-rattling pothole in a 20-point blowout by Woodland Hills Taft.
The Knights (17-4) need a front-end alignment.
They vacated their status as the No. 2 team in the Union-Tribune weekly sportswriters- broadcasters poll after losses of 61-60 and 76-56 to the above-mentioned squads and now are looking up at St. Augustine and Torrey Pines.
A greater indignity for Brad Leaf’s team was banishment from the Cal-Hi Sports state top 20. Foothills fell from No. 7 to on-the-bubble status.
It doesn’t get easier.
The Knights face mighty Oak Hill Prep of Mouth of Wilson, Virginia, Friday night in the Nike Extravaganza at Santa Ana Mater Dei.
Promoters figure the Knights are a warmup for Oak Hill, which, with a victory, will ease into a Saturday night contest with U.S. No. 1 Chino Hills.
After sharing the top spot with Foothills Christian in the U.T. poll’s first four weeks, St. Augustine (19-3) sits in first place by its ownself.
But, following Western League games with Morse (80-48 victory last night) and likely pushover Mira Mesa Friday, the Saints then jump into hot water in the Nike Extravaganza Saturday evening.
St. Augustine gets a rematch against the host Monarchs, who defeated the Saints, 86-62, in December.
LITTLETON GOES FOR 4K
The Bishop’s Destiny Littleton figures to pass the 4,000-point career scoring mark pretty soon.
Littleton broke Charde Houston’s record of 3,837 a couple weeks ago and is scoring with the swiftness of a rocket eating up miles in the stratosphere.
Marlin Wells’ Knights are 22-1 and stayed 20th in the Cal-Hi girls’ state top 20 while 20-2 Mission Hills moved from fifth to fourth.
Poll participants include John Maffei, San Diego Union-Tribune; Steve Brand (San Diego Hall of Champions), Terry Monahan, Bill Dickens, Adam Paul, EastCountySports.com; Rick Willis, KUSI-TV; Rick Smith, partletonsports.com; Bodie DeSilva, sandiegopreps.com; Chris Davis, freelance; Aaron Burgin, fulltimehoops.com.
1949: Death on the Highway
La Jolla’s Jim Prather was a member of the Southern Section team in the first College Prep All-StarGame against the CIF Los Angeles City Section and set up set up a touchdown with a 46-yard punt return as Prather’s side scored a 27-7 victory.
It was to be the last game ever for Prather, who was driving to Tucson four days later with Ellis Craddock, a Grossmont High graduate and Prather’s sponsoring-Breitbard Athletic Foundation-game teammate.
Prather led La Jolla Vikings to 7-1 record in 1948.
‘SUICIDE DOORS’
Prather, asleep in the passenger seat, and Craddock were to enroll at the University of Arizona and turn out for football practice when they were involved in a two-car collision on U.S. 80 in Arizona between Gila Bend and Casa Grande.
Prather sustained serious injuries. Craddock and four persons in the other auto were killed.
Until they drove to St. Mary’s Hospital in Tucson from their home in Pacific Beach and saw Jim in the hospital, members of Prather’s family, who made the stressful, uncertain, eight-hour drive with members of Craddock’s family, knew only that one person in Jim’s car had survived.
Prather believed he was alive because the automobile in which he was riding was equipped with “suicide doors,” which are hinged toward the back of the vehicle.
Upon impact Prather was thrown from the car. He would have been trapped inside if the car had the more modern passenger doors, said Jim’s son, David.
Jim recovered but did not play collegiate football. U. of A. coach Bob Winslow announced that the school would honor Prather’s scholarship.
Back home, Jim found another sport to his liking.
Brother Phil, childhood friend Delmar Miller, and Jim formed one of the top Southern California beach over-the-line softball teams and were fixtures in the Old Mission Beach Athletic Club’s yearly tournament.
CARNIVAL FAVORS WEST
The all-star game was followed by the 11th annual football carnival, presented by the San Diego City Schools’ Association, and marking the usual opening of the season.
The circus-like event featured about 200 football players and pageantry that included 1,000 cheerleaders, band members, flag twirlers, drum majors and majorettes.
The West, comprised of Hoover, Chula Vista (added entry from the county), and La Jolla, defeated the East, made up of Kearny, San Diego, and Point Loma, 7-6, before an official crowd of 25,096 persons and a Channel 8 television audience.
Each team engaged in one of three, 15-minute quarters.
Craddock (33 in front row) rode with Prather (second row, directly behind 81 and 88).
San Diego and Hoover played to a scoreless tie in the final period. Compared to previous games the tie was a moral victory for the Cardinals.
It had been six years since Hoover had been competitive with San Diego, enduring blowout losses by scores of 72-0, 38-6, 48-7, 25-0, and 39-7.
Hoover would experience more success against the Cavemen later in the season as the course of San Diego football veered briefly from its normal direction but would take a radical turn in the coming decade.
The Cardinals claimed city bragging rights for the first time since 1943 with a 28-13 victory over San Diego and Point Loma won a Southern California playoff championship, the first for a local team since Grossmont in 1927.
The city was growing, as were the number of television sets and aluminum antennas above San Diego rooftops.
The coming San Diego 1950 census would declare a population of 334,000 residents, with another 123,000 in the surrounding area.
There were 20 high schools in the County, including Julian, which did not field a team, and its Laguna Mountains neighbor, tiny Mountain Empire in Campo.
The population growth was just one reason San Diego schools were taking the first step toward an eventual break from the CIF Southern Section.
ALL ROADS LEAD TO…
Another and perhaps more important factor was that for 30-plus years athletic rivals in and around Los Angeles and Orange counties had complained of scheduling problems and travel involving teams from the “Border Town.”
The modern automobile and U.S. highways 101 and 395, San Diego’s main south-north arteries, assured a faster trip to and from those distant locales but freeways still were years down the road.
Ed Perriera (arrow, top) gained nine yards on this play in Point Loma’s 27-14 victory over Bonita for Southern California minor division title.
A San Diego-to-Pasadena journey, through more than a dozen communities, stop signs and traffic signals, was minimally 3 hours. Included were the 17 miles from Oceanside to San Clemente that included dangerous stretches when the highway was three lanes and shrouded in fog.
San Diego High had been a member of the Coast League since 1923 with exception of the travel-restricted years of World War II. Coast League membership in 1949 also included Compton, Pasadena, Pasadena Muir, Grossmont and Hoover.
The 1949-50 school year beginning in September would mark a final act for the San Diego group, with a local City Prep League being created the following school year.
Included in the changing landscape was the first Breitbard game, which drew 12,000 fans to Balboa Stadium and was played in early September.
Jim Prather’s teammate, San Diego High’s Charlie Davis, was the game’s “Star of Stars,” scoring two touchdowns, and Cavers teammate Granville Walton caught a touchdown pass in the Southern Section victory.
The game, featuring recent high school graduates, was the brainchild of Hoover graduate Bob Breitbard, a San Diego sportsman and businessman for almost 70 years.
POINTERS DON’T FADE
San Diego’s power and dominance seemed intact when the Cavers’ Darnes Johnson returned the opening kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown the following week in a win against Point Loma.
But the Pointers spat back. They scored the only touchdown of the second half after falling behind, 28-6. A loss to Phoenix the next week had sportswriters saying the Cavemen could be had.
Hoover’s Joe Duke avoided San Diego’s Darnes Johnson (33), but Charlie Powell (right) came up to make tackle.
Hoover was waiting for the opportunity. Second-year coach Bob Kirchhoff greeted more returning lettermen and more returning starters than any Coast League squad.
The Cardinals lost one game, 26-7 to eventual Southern California champion Compton, but they slammed the Cavemen 28-13, rushing for 285 yards and never were threatened, leading 21-0 at the half, and winning the 17th annual battle for the first time since a 7-3 victory in 1943.
TUESDAY FOOTBALL WITH “MR. OUTSIDE”
Don Giddings, who was a tackle on Hobbs Adams’ 1929-31 San Diego High teams and who would move from head coach to principal at Point Loma and later to Patrick Henry, had positioned the Pointers for a championship run in the so-called CIF Lower Division.
Point Loma relied on backs Ed Perreira, Eddie Silva, and Marshall (Scooter) Malcolm (from left), who accepted handoff from Jim Dible.
The Pointers rolled through the Metropolitan League after their opening-game loss to San Diego, stalling only once in a 13-13 tie with La Jolla, then winning three playoff games by scores of 48-7, 42-12, and 27-14.
Point Loma and Bonita High met for the championship at Point Loma on a Tuesday afternoon. The schools had not been able to agree on where or when to play the game. Southern Section commissioner Seth Van Patten ruled that Point Loma could choose the site and Bonita could choose the date.
Among those in attendance was Glenn Davis, the legendary “Mr. Outside” of West Point fame and holder of the CIF record for most points in a season, having scored 242 points for Bonita in 1942.
Davis beat a hasty retreat to the stands when he was swarmed by a covey of coeds.
Coach Bob Kirchhoff greeted Hoover gridders Joe Duke, Eddie Johns, Bill Freeman, Phil Rutkowski, and Evan Wetherald (from left) at start of September practice.
LEAGUES PROPOSED
Three days before Point Loma’s season-ending victory, a December 11 meeting in Los Angeles threatened to derail plans for the re-leaguing of 19 San Diego schools (St. Augustine was a member of the Los Angeles-based Southland Catholic League and not in consideration for local membership).
Hoover principal Floyd Johnson, a member of the Southern Section executive committee, and leader of the San Diego group, proposed a six team City League of Hoover, San Diego, Kearny, La Jolla, Grossmont, and Point Loma; seven-team Metropolitan League of Chula Vista, Escondido, Sweetwater, Coronado, Vista, Oceanside, and San Dieguito, and a six-team Southern Prep League of Fallbrook, Army-Navy, Brown Military, Mountain Empire, and Julian.
Johnson’s plan already faced opposition.
Officials from Vista, Fallbrook, Escondido, Oceanside, and San Dieguito had met in Carlsbad three weeks earlier to discuss formation of a “Northern San Diego County League”. Those schools suggested that their problems involving transportation and minor sports competition would be answered.
The CIF Southern Section denied the San Diego delegation’s proposal because of “divided reports.” The Johnson-led faction was told to “get its house in order” and come back in February.
San Diego quarterback Chuck McDairmant (left) and Grossmont halfback Alan Archard exercised for cameraman before Coast League game.
Most of Johnson’s proposal eventually was approved by the Southern Section.
San Diego, Grossmont, and Hoover, as part of the new CPL, would say goodbye to the Coast League, which would reincarnate with Compton, Norwalk Excelsior, and the three Long Beach schools, Poly, Wilson, and Jordan.
Pasadena was expected to go into a league with Alhambra, El Monte, Alhambra Mark Keppel, Monrovia, and Whittier. Muir would align in a league with Bell Gardens, Rosemead, Covina, Downey, and Montebello.
Geography (i.e., travel) and school enrollment were principal factors in all potential realignment, which would be settled in February, 1950.
HONORS
San Diego tackle Frank San Fillipo was a first-team, all-Southern California choice. Fullback Eddie Silva of Point Loma and Grossmont’s Ellis Craddock were on the third team.
Ballet? Willie Thompson (left) and Buddy Lewis (16) of Point Loma go high to bat down end zone pass to La Jolla’s Ronnie Epps. Defensive play helped Pointers survive 13-13 tie with Vikings and clinch Metropolitan League title.
CARDINALS WITHOUT A NEST
Hoover’s 8-1 record was achieved under unusual conditions.
Fire destroyed the wooden bleachers on the East side of the campus stadium before the 1948 season. A new, steel-framed seating area was ready but stadium lights still were in production as the 1949 campaign got under way.
Hoover principal Floyd Johnson announced that the Cardinals’ Coast League opener with Muir would be moved to Pasadena and the Rose Bowl.
“If the lights aren’t ready for the October twenty-first game against Grossmont (next opponent) I don’t know what we’ll do,” said Johnson.
What Hoover did was play its entire regular-season schedule on the road, with “home” games at San Diego State’s Aztec Bowl.
Hoover participated in a postseason charity game to help pay for 14 blood transfusions and surgery that resulted in more than $3,000 in hospital bills for injured Grossmont player Bill Finneran, who sustained a near-fatal kidney injury in an early-season game with Sweetwater.
The game was scheduled for Aztec Bowl, then switched to Hoover, which still had no lights. Kickoff for the Finneran game was at 10 a.m and Hoover beat the Foothillers for the second time, 12-7.
WHO HAS THE BALL?
Yes, that is fog enveloping Point Loma’s Ross Field. Sweetwater tacklers were able to stop Pointers’ Willie Thompson, but Peninsula club clinched Metropolitan League championship on surreal afternoon, 33-12.
Fog was a ubiquitous and frustrating companion.
San Dieguito coach Curtis French blamed the shroud for a 20-13 loss to Escondido after the Cougars returned the opening kickoff for a touchdown. “We lost track of the ball and didn’t know who to tackle,” said French.
Writer Jerry Brucker said radar was needed to follow the action, the fog being so thick in the Hoover-Pasadena skirmish at Aztec Bowl.
KIRCHHOFF ANGRY WINNER
Hoover coach Bob Kirchhoff would not forget the season opener against the San Bernardino Cardinals at the Orange Show Bowl in ‘Berdoo.
Hoover won 13-7 but Kirchhoff was sizzling, describing the game officiating as the worst he’d ever seen.
“Hoover High played an aggressive game, perhaps a bit too much, as they were sent back 95 yards on 11 penalties, four of them being for 15 yards,” wrote Sid Olin of the San Bernardino Sun. “The Cardinals (San Bernardino) took but two penalties for off-sides.
The term for officiating at road games often has been “Home Cooking.” The Hoover mentor’s choice of words was much stronger.
Alan Archard, coach Lee Bogle, Martin Beck, Gilbert Bonilla, Jay Harris (obscured), Bill Long, and Ernie Magginni talked about the weather before first practice.
BETTER THAN JOHNNY O
St. Augustine coach Dave DeVarona, detoxing from an 0-5-2 season, singled out running back Claude Thomas, who, despite the winless campaign, earned first team, all-league honors in the Southland Catholic circuit.
DeVarona said that Thomas was the league’s hardest running back and a better, all-around player than St. Anthony’s Johnny Olszewski, who scored five touchdowns against the Saints in 1948 and took his team to the Southern California finals.
NEW SCHOOL AT 49TH AND IMPERIAL
Lincoln Junior High, numbering first-day enrollment of 502 students, opened with classes for seventh and eighth graders.
Lincoln gradually became a high school. A ninth grade was added in 1950-51. Tenth grade students were included in 1952-53, followed by an 11th grade class in ’53-54, and the first senior class in 1954-55.
Lincoln was a grade 7-12 school with split sessions in the 1954-55 school year, becoming an all-high school student body of three grades in 1955-56.
Did they wear wrong jerseys or wrong helmets? George Eggert (left) and brother Tom could have confused opponents or game officials with their selection of numbers.
QUICK KICKS
La Jolla had new lights installed at its Scripps Field…Chula Vista dedicated its new football stadium, named after principal Joe Rindone, with a 34-6 victory over Oceanside…Grossmont earned praise for publishing a preseason “press guide” that compared to those of Pacific Coast Conference universities… Brucker on San Diego junior Charlie Powell, who had been moved from end to fullback in spring drills and who gained 99 yards in 14 carries and went 65 yards on a pass play against Phoenix: “The big boy (225 pounds) was a solid, uranium sensation for the Hillers, a blocking, tackling, stiff-arming and side-stepping terror”… Powell had 87 yards in 11 carries and Frank Johnson 88 in 10 in a 34-13 win at Pasadena, highlighting a long day for the two Cavers and their teammates… the team boarded buses at San Diego High at 8 a.m. and didn’t return home until after 8 that night…the trip was typical for Coast League road teams…Compton was officially declared Coast League champion by a 4-3 vote… the Tarbabes finished with a 4-0 league record, Hoover 4-1…the Cardinals wanted Compton to reschedule a previously canceled game with Muir… the cancelation was fallout from Compton Junior College’s suspension of relations with Muir’s upper level institution, Muir Junior College, over recruitment of a player by Muir J.C. the previous year… unsaid was how a vote against Compton would have helped Hoover’s playoff hopes, the Cardinals having lost the head-and-head meeting with Compton… Manny Gomes, Point Loma’s first-team all-Metropolitan League end, converted 32 of 40 point-after-touchdown kicks… in the 13-13 tie with La Jolla one of Gomes’ attempts was blocked… Manny enjoyed a long career as a San Diego-area football and basketball game official and was a National Basketball Association referee….
2017: La Jolla Vikings Great Dan Berry
Dan Berry passed recently at age 72, leaving a historic legacy at La Jolla High and of significant achievements at San Diego City College and the University of California at Berkeley.
When La Jolla met San Diego High at Scripps Field in 1961, the Vikings had not beaten the Cavemen since 1951 and were reeling from 57-0 and 59-0 knockouts in the two most recent meetings.
Berry, an all-San Diego Section first-team selection, rushed for 153 yards in 20 carries, scored a touchdown and passed for two, and charged a three-touchdown, fourth-quarter rally as the Vikings, trailing, 19-7, defeated the Cavers, 27-19.
Lefty Berry ran, passed, and drove La Jolla to big win and niche among all-time Vikings.
The seaside team’s victory should have created some sports world buzz, but the game was played on Thursday night, a day earlier than usual.
Friday night was when the media spotlight was on the high schools.
The Evening Tribune did not send a reporter to the game and The San Diego Union‘s coverage of the contest was consigned to back pages of the sports section.
La Jollans were outraged.
Many of the beach community’s residents flooded the nearby office of publisher James Copley with telephone calls expressing anger that Copley’s newspapers had given their team short shrift.
Copley got the message.
An order soon came down from the fourth floor at the Union-Tribune building on Second Avenue in downtown San Diego.
Henceforth the Tribune would carry a full page of prep photo coverage plus a full page of stories and reports each Saturday on games throughout the County.
KNIGHTS THRIVE WITH DAN
Dan Berry and the Vikings had a lot to do with that emphasis on the exploits of the area’s prepsters.
Berry later led San Diego City College to a best-ever 9-1 record and come-from-behind, 28-24 victory over Orange Coast College in the 1964 San Bernardino Elks Bowl.
The 6-foot, 1-inch, 200-pounder was described by Orange Coast coach Dick Tucker as “the best junior college player in Southern California.”
MEMORIAL SCHEDULED
Berry went on to letter at quarterback and running back for two seasons at Berkeley, and was a fifth round draft selection of the NFL Philadelphia Eagles in 1967. His career was short-circuited by injuries.
Berry’s wife, Kathy, said that on Feb. 18 a celebration of Dan’s life will be held at the family residence.
1944-45: Hoover No. 1 twice in Southern California Basketball
It’s a footnote almost forgotten—a rare winning parlay involving a basketball team from San Diego.
The Hoover Cardinals were champions of Southern California and center Dick Barnes was player of the year. One feat had been accomplished, but not two, and not in the same season.
Barnes, a 6-foot, 5-inch center, and his teammates won the third annual Beverly Hills Invitational, the premier prep hoops event in Southern California during World War II.
It wasn’t the Southern Section playoffs, on hiatus in 1944 and ’45, but the tournament had more cachet.
Barnes (57) averaged 16 points a game for the champion Cardinals.
Sixteen of the best teams in the Southland were included in a killer bracket in which the winner would have to play four games in two days at Beverly Hills High.
4 GAMES, 4 WINS
Hoover opened at 4:15 p.m. on Friday, February 24, 1945, against Bay League power Santa Monica.
Barnes stunned the Vikings with a school-record 36 points as the Cardinals eased to a 54-44 victory.
With a couple hours to relax and get a bite to eat, coach Rickey Wilson and players watched Santa Barbara score a 45-27 victory over Redondo Beach Redondo, the Southern Section champion in 1942-43.
Hoover took on Santa Barbara at 9:15 that night. Barnes scored 12 points and the Redbirds won again, 46-36.
The Cardinals were back at it at 2 the next afternoon and Barnes, virtually unstoppable around the basket from his pivot position, scored 18 points in a 46-44, overtime triumph against South Pasadena.
No time for a sit-down, Saturday evening dinner.
The boys tipped again versus Whittier in the championship game at 7 p.m.
Barnes led the way with 21 points for a four-game total of 87 and Hoover earned a 47-36, title-clinching win.
All in a day’s work, or about 30 hours.
HELMS NOTICES
Coed Vivian Denniston liked Barnes’ moves, on the court.
Ten days later the Helms Athletic Foundation not surprisingly announced that Barnes was the Southern California player of the year.
Barnes was the only major division player to capture the individual honor during San Diego’s Southern Section association, which ended in 1960.
San Diego, in 1935-36, was the only team other than the Cardinals to win the major championship.
Hoover also had won the first Beverly Hills tournament in 1943, the competition lessened by the still-operating Southern Section playoffs.
Head coach Rickey Wilson stuck around through the 1945-46 season and then moved to Amherst College in Massachusetts.
HUGE CROWD
Hoover finished with a 16-2 record, including an 8-0 run through the Victory League.
The only losses were 40-36 to an alumni squad and 26-25 to San Diego in the Victory League preseason tournament.
The Cardinals had lost four of the previous five to San Diego but swept the Hilltoppers in league play, 39-28 (Bob Kuykendall scored 20), and 29-24.
The second game at Hoover was played before a turnaway crowd of 2,000 persons, according to Bob Lantz, The San Diego Union correspondent.
TROUBLE ON THE HILLTOP
Hoover’s victory over San Diego brought to light a simmering issue at San Diego High, where coach John Brose, faced with a “strike” by five players, didn’t blink.
“We’ll carry on with a better spirit and healthier attitude than before,” said Brose after five players who did not practice on Monday, had met secretly, and turned in their gear.
The players included Tom Powell, the Victory League’s leading scorer in football and a starting center for Brose; Mario Lopez, Jack Harshman, a future major league outfielder-pitcher; John Herman, and Fontelle Kennerly.
All of the players either were starters or saw regular playing time, according to The San Diego Union.
Capt. Tom Powell was one of San Diego’s unhappy Hillers. Forward Gene Deveraux (inset) was happy Cardinal.
Trouble apparently had been brewing all season and came to a head after the five-point loss to Hoover.
Brose had criticized his team for its “indifferent attitude and listless play” and then announced before the Hoover game that he was benching all of his starters, except team captain Powell.
Brose inserted the rest of the regulars in the second quarter, but played his reserves most of the second half as Barnes scored 19 points and kept the Cardinals in command.
None of the San Diego players returned. Brose promoted second stringers and the Hillers still won seven of their last nine games, including 5 out 6 in the league to finish in a tie for second with Coronado at 6-2. They were 15-6 overall.
HOW STRICT?
Wartime travel restrictions forced cancelation of an early December game at Hoover against Redondo.
The Seahawks would have had to travel 120 miles each way, a journey close to 3 hours each way. A CIF travel limit of 25 miles apparently still was in effect, although CIF schools had been slowly loosening the travel edict.
Long Beach Poly, Los Angeles Mt. Carmel, and Fallbrook had come south for games during the football season and Hoover had visited Redondo.
Victory in Europe was achieved on May 8, 1945, and in Japan on Aug. 15, 1945.
DISTANCE QUESTION
Dick Jackson’s set shot in overtime gave San Diego a 17-15 victory over Sweetwater. The Union declared that Jackson’s attempt was launched from 20 feet.
The perhaps more partisan San Diego High Russ said Jackson’s shot, with three seconds remaining in the extra session, was a 30-footer.
Coronado’s Dave Melton had 71 points, second to Dick Barnes’ 128, for runner-up honors in Victory League play. Melton played nine seasons in the Triple-A baseball Pacific Coast League baseball and parts of two seasons with the major league Kansas City Athletics.
KEEP THE DOORS OPEN
Basketball was a Hoover thing.
Cardinals principal Floyd Johnson, with some urging from coach Rickey Wilson, reached an agreement with the recreation department to open the Hoover gymnasium on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday nights from 6:30 to 9:30.
The facility, largest in the city, with bleachers and a balcony on the east side of the building, and bleachers on the opposite side, would be open to all “junior and senior high boys throughout the city.”
Basketball edifices in the city were not plentiful. Gymnasiums existed at Hoover, San Diego, San Diego State, and at the municipal facility in Balboa Park.
La Jolla, San Diego Vocational, and Point Loma played their homes games on outdoor courts and had to reschedule “rained-out” contests in February.
SIGNS OF THE TIME
The Hillcrest-Five Points “Little Freeway” on Washington Street opened in February.
The four-lane thoroughfare between Mission Hills and the bayfront area included a bus route for defense workers coming from the northern and eastern sectors of the city.
The part-time route would be in effect when shifts were changing at Consolidated, Ryan, and Solar aircraft plants.
Traffic signals were to be put in place on Washington Street at Hawk and Ibis, Harbor Drive at 32nd Street, Boundary and Maple, Laurel and Commonwealth, Covington Road at Boundary, and at 32nd and Commercial.
The lights were part of a “catching up” program that had been delayed by war production board restrictions.
Kearny was building for the future with its Class C (Cees) team, winner of the Coronado Lightweights Tournament,
SET SHOTS
.Hoover’s player of the year was the same Dick Barnes who was the first player from San Diego drafted by a National Basketball Association team, in the fifth round by the New York Knickerbockers in 1950. Barnes played at San Diego State following Hoover but passed on the NBA…Peggy Brose, the daughter of San Diego coach John Brose, was an honored, longtime coach of girls’ high school basketball a generation later in San Diego…an up and comer at Point Loma was sophomore Don Larson (sic), better known as Don Larsen, who pitched the first perfect game in the World Series for the New York Yankees in 1956…Kearny principal Edward Taylor, the man behind the creation of the annual City football carnival in 1939, spoke of Victory League schools forming their own section, apart from commissioner Seth Van Patten’s Southern Section…Taylor was quoted in The San Diego Union of Jan. 10, 1945, about an upcoming meeting of league bosses at which the idea would be discussed…no information came out of the meeting to indicate the idea was just that, an idea…Coronado coach Hal Niedermeyer thought that the 13 points George Masek scored against Vocational represented the highest point total ever for a Coronado player at the guard position in Niedermeyer’s 16 seasons….
2016-17 Week 5: Movement at the Top
Idleness apparently breeds contempt among voters in the weekly Union-Tribune poll.
St. Augustine, tied for first with Foothills Christian last week, played one game and defeated Lincoln, 68-62.
Foothills played two, winning 84-45 over West Hills and defeating Coastal League rival Santa Fe Christian, 68-61.
Two Knights victories over the Saints’ one apparently was enough for one voter, who broke the seasonal tie for first between Foothills and the Saints.
Foothills, with 6 first-place votes to St. Augustine’s 4, this week is the No. 1 team in the San Diego Section.
The teams’ position in the weekly Cal-Hi Sports‘ top 20 didn’t change, Foothills remaining seven in the state and the Saints’ 11th. Torrey Pines is on the bubble.
Foothills should get a passable test Saturday in the “Greatest Show on Earth” Shootout against Woodland Hills Taft at Los Angeles Cathedral.
Other San Diego voting saw Mission Hills jump from seventh to fourth, Vista drop from fourth to sixth, Mater Dei climb from 10th to seventh, and La Jolla fall from sixth to ninth.
A 62-60 victory over No. 4 Chatsworth Sierra Canyon moved Mission Hills (18-2) from eighth to fifth in the girls’ Top 20. A 65-52 win over Capistrano JSerra helped The Bishop’s (20-1) remain 20th. La Jolla Country Day (10-10) is on the bubble.
Union-Tribune boys’ poll through Tuesday, Jan. 17:
Poll participants include John Maffei, San Diego Union-Tribune; Steve Brand (San Diego Hall of Champions), Terry Monahan, Bill Dickens, Adam Paul, EastCountySports.com; Rick Willis, KUSI-TV; Rick Smith, partletonsports.com; Bodie DeSilva, sandiegopreps.com; Chris Davis, freelance; Aaron Burgin, fulltimehoops.com.
