Foothills Christian, No. 1 in the first Union-Tribune basketball poll, was 4-0 before being savaged by a piranha-like attack from the Chino Hills Huskies in finals of the Battle Zone Tournament at Corona Centennial Saturday night.

Final score, 106-86.

Foothills’ T.J. Leaf scored 44 points and was 21 for 27 from the field, but the Knights were swamped at the outset by  a withering, all-court press and trailed, 22-5, in  the first four minutes.

It was 40-13, at the end of the first quarter.

The El Cajon squad actually outscored the Chino Hills, 73-66, over the last three quarters, but it never really was in it, getting no closer than 18 points at 67-49.

The Huskies, aggressively rebounding at both ends of the court,  answered any attempted Foothills incursion with breakaways or some sharp three-point sniping.

Foothills Christian won its first four Battle Zone games, defeating Temecula Great Oak, 84-42, Etiwanda, 73-43, Corona Centennial, 69-61, and Temecula Rancho Christian, 96-58.

The Knights will get another chance at Chino Hills,  Max Preps‘ state No. 3-ranked team when they meet Jan. 9 in  the Sierra Canyon Super Showcase in Chatsworth.

Second-ranked Cathedral opens the season Thursday against San Francisco St. Ignatius in the Father Barry Tournament hosted by Carmichael Jesuit.

No. 3 St. Augustine is 4-0 after winning the Pasadena Rose City Classic at Maranatha Christian with a 52-50 victory over Montebello Cantwell Sacred Heart.

The Saints’ other tournament victories were 52-50 over Sherman Oaks Notre Dame, 58-47 over Pomona Diamond Ranch, and 62-42 over Valencia West Ranch.

Idleness breeds contempt or a drop in the ratings.

Mission Hills has fallen from ninth to 11th in Cal-Hi Sports’ state top 25, partly because the Grizzlies drew a bye in the first round of the San Diego Section playoffs last week.

Also byed last week, Helix remained 12th.  Cathedral  and St. Augustine  are on the bubble after they, too, sat out.

Under Cal Hi’s nomenclature, there are no Open division ratings, but begin with Division I and with 15 teams rated.

Mission Hills is 10th and Helix 12th in D-I.  St. Augustine is fifth and Cathedral 12th in D-II followed by  one-the-bubble Valhalla.

Ten teams are rated in D-III-V, with Bonita Vista (III), Santa Fe Christian (IV), and La Jolla Country Day (V) on the bubble.

The San Diego Section playoffs increase in interest this week after a first round in which there were few surprises and the clearing process of washing out bad teams began.

Forty-six  teams in six divisions are still alive, with 23 games scheduled.

Helix-Madison (Open), San Marcos-Oceanside (I), and Christian-Valhalla (II) match  No. 8 seeds versus No. 1 seeds in each division but probably have the most marquee value.

Does Madison, which could contend for a state championship if it were left in its natural D-IV environment, have a shot against the fast, savvy Highlanders?

Westview (5)-at Mt. Carmel (4) promises an old-fashioned, roll-in-the-dirt, backyard brawl in D-II.  The schools are very close geographically.

Imperial (5)-Santa Fe Christian (4) has a distinct intersectional flavor in D-III.  So does Calexico Vincent Memorial (3)-Crawford (2) in D-5, with the Imperial Valley schools making the long trek over the mountains.

The Rock takes on Calvin Christian for the D-VI championship.

HERE COMES BASKETBALL

Foothills Christian is sixth and St. Augustine 17th in Cal-Hi’s preseason top 35. Torrey Pines  and Cathedral are in the “just missed” category.

Foothills, with 6-foot, 9-inch nationally recognized T.J. Leaf, was 25-7 last season.  So was St. Augustine, which returns its entire starting five.

QUICK KICKS

Fallbrook writer David Willauer reminds that Warriors under Kyle Williams were 2-9 in ’13,  6-4 in ’14, and  now are 7-4 after a  7-3 win over 5-6 Hilltop in first round of D-III…the seventh-seeded Warriors visit second-seeded Mission Bay (8-2) this week…

 

Lance Morton, Rich Gehring, and Sam Edwards are among former San Diego prep athletes who  recently passed away.

Morton, 81,  a founder of the Brigantine Restaurant chain, was a second team all-City Prep League  end on the 1951 Point Loma squad that finished with a 6-2 record, losing only to San Diego, 15-6, and La Jolla, 21-14, teams that tied for CPL championship.

Morton also was a standout in track and field and held the Pointers record in the shot put for several years at 51 feet, 3 1/4 inches.

Rich Gehring, 80, had bests of :15 in the 120-yard high hurdles and :20 in the 180 lows and was a double winner for Escondido in the 1953 Metropolitan League track finals.

Gehrig, also played end on the Cougars’ football team and was the leading scorer in the County with 443 points in the 1952-53 basketball season.

The 6-foot, 5-inch Gehring was an important member of the 1955-56 San Diego State basketball squad that advanced to the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics championship tournament in Kansas City.

Gehring later was head track coach at Sweetwater High and Southwestern College.

Sam Edwards, 74,  was an end and defensive end on the 1958 San Diego High team that posted a 10-1 record, scored 457 points, and was one of the premier teams in Southern California.

Edwards, all-City  on defense for a team that allowed 57 points in 11 games, caught 4 of quarterback Ezell Singleton’s 28 touchdown passes and was one of nine Cavers who scored at least four touchdowns.

Wait till next year seems appropriate in San Diego Section basketball, according to the Cal-Hi Sports newsletter.

The Stockton-based publication is suggesting that St. Augustine could be a Top 20 team in the 2015-16 season.

That would be an accomplishment, since no San Diego squad finished in Cal-Hi Sports’ Top 20 this season.

St. Augustine was 23rd, Torrey Pines 24th, and Foothills Christian 26th in the online publication’s final top 40.

La Jolla Country Day was 15th in the girls’ ratings, Mission Hills 30th.

“”Pencil in the CIF San Diego Section Open Division champs (St. Augustine’s Saints) as a State Top 20 team next season, with five returning starters, including freshman standout Taeshon Taylor,” wrote Cal-Hi honcho Mark Tennis.

“The game that boosts the (Torrey Pines) Falcons up for the final rankings was their 54-49 win over No. 25 Long Beach Poly in one of the bigger upsets in the SoCal regionals,” said Tennis.

St. Augustine and Torrey Pines had not been ranked in prior Cal-Hi ratings.  Foothills Christian jumped from 35th after a one-point loss to Rancho Cucamonga Etiwanda (No. 5) in the regionals.

La Jolla Country Day’s girls achieved a lofty position with the poorest record (18-11) of any Boys’ or Girls’ Top 20 club.

“Anyone who saw the Torreys in person (on television or at the University of California’s Haas Arena) could see this is a team of the future that arrived in the state playoffs,” said Tennis.

“Because of injuries to several girls, including promising sophomore Alaysia Styles, 2012 coach of the year Terri Bamford had to retool the team,” Tennis noted.  “LJCD definitely will be the top preseason team to beat from the San Diego Section.”

 

 

San Diego Section teams came home with one championship in the state basketball tournament, old reliable La Jolla Country Day’s girls winning in Division V, 40-36 over Palo Alto Eastside Prep.

The title was coach Terry Bamford’s fourth.  The Torreys finished with an 18-11 record, not their best, but Bamford sees the big picture, schedules tough, and points to March. Eastside was the Central Coast Section champion and No. 1 seed in the North.

The Torreys and The Bishop’s, both beaten in league and section  play by state-uninvited Horizon, owned the division, racing through the Southern California playoffs before ‘Day knocked off the Knights, 75-56, in the finals.

A disappointing boys season  concluded with Torrey Pines and Army-Navy coming up short in the D-1 and D-5 semifinals, respectively.

Coach John Olive’s Torrey Pines Falcons battled through the rounds as a No. 6 seed before losing at 2 seed Chino Hills, 64-57.

Army-Navy, coached by John Maffucci, in his 59th year at the academy, was a No. 6 seed and battled 2 seed Los Angeles Price before coming up short, 67-62.

The area top teams would have been better served had the CIF San Diego Section placed St. Augustine and Foothills Christian in their proper divisions.

Instead 7 seed St. Augustine was forced to go to the Open Division instead of D-III for the second year in a row and bowed to second-ranked Torrance Bishop Montgomery, 75-61, and Foothills, the 6 seed, came up short at 3 seed Rancho Cucamonga Etiwanda, 56-55.

With largely underclass squads, the Saints and Knights could be the top teams in the San Diego Section next season.  But they again likely will face a stacked deck by being pushed into the Open Division playoffs.

It’s a system that needs more than a tweak.

BOYS

OPEN

ROUND 1

 7 St. Augustine 61, @2 Torrance Bishop Montgomery 75.

6 Foothills Christian 55, @3 Rancho Cucamonga Etiwanda 56.

DIVISION I

ROUND 1

6 Torrey Pines 62, 11 N. Tustin Foothill 49.

10 San Marcos 60, @7 Riverside J.W. North 57.

QUARTERFINALS

Torrey Pines 54, @3 Long Beach Poly 49.

San Marcos 63, @2 Chino Hills 82.

SEMIFINALS

Torrey Pines 57, @Chino Hills 64.

II

ROUND 1

1 La Costa Canyon 74, 16 Las Flores Tesoro 53.

12 Mira Mesa 67, @5 Redlands East Valley 75.

15 Kearny 65, @2 Anaheim Canyon 98.

QUARTERFINALS

1 La Costa Canyon 69, 8 Santa Barbara 44.  

SEMIFINALS  

1 La Costa Canyon 46, 4 Lawndale 60.

III

ROUND 1

12 Valhalla 76, @ 5 La Habra Sonora 101. 

7 El Cajon Valley 33, 10 Newport Beach Corona del Mar 46. 

IV

ROUND 1

14 Granite Hills 49, @3 Encino Crespi 78.

6 Mission Bay 58, 11 Cerritos Valley Christian 66.

V

ROUND 1

6 Army-Navy 91, 11 Hesperia Christian 52.

10 Lutheran 52, @7 Temecula Rancho Christian 70.

QUARTERFINALS

6 Army-Navy 60, @3 L.A. Windward 52.

SEMIFINALS

Army-Navy 62, @2 L.A. Price 67.

GIRLS                                                                                                         

OPEN

ROUND 1

6 Mission Hills 41, @3 Long Beach Poly 58.    

I

ROUND 1

12 Torrey Pines 51, @5 San Bernardino 81.

15 Eastlake 50, @2 Vista Murietta 70.

II

ROUND 1

12 La Costa Canyon 57, @5 Norco 65.

III

ROUND 1

14 Westview 31, @3 Mira Costa 59.

12, Kearny 34, @5 Newport Beach Corona del Mar 70.

11 Rancho Bernardo 42, @6 Rancho Santa Margarita 48.

IV

ROUND 1

9 El Capitan  26, @8 San Juan Capistrano JSerra 67.

12 San Ysidro 31, @5 Anaheim Fairmont Prep 78. 

V

ROUND 1

1 La Jolla Country Day, bye.

2 The Bishop’s 79, 15 L.A. Price 30.

11 Escondido Adventist 18, @6 San Bernardino Aquinas 61.

QUARTERFINALS

2 The Bishop’s 73, 7 Santa Barbara Bishop Diego 49.

1 La Jolla Country Day 69, 9 Caruthers 20.

SEMIFINALS

1 La Jolla Country Day 64,  4 L.A. Ribet 36.

The Bishop’s 55, 3 Garden Grove Orangewood 48, OT.

CHAMPIONSHIP

La Jolla Country Day 75, The Bishop’s 56.

STATE

La Jolla Country Day 40, 1 Palo Alto Eastside Prep 36, @Haas Arena, California-Berkeley.

Can coach John Olive’s tough-minded, resourceful Torrey Pines Falcons pull off another victory in Tuesday’s Southern California playoff Division I semifinals?

The No. 6-seed Falcons, trailing, 43-40, after three quarters, walked down host No. 3 Long Beach Poly, 54-49, in the quarterfinals Saturday night.  The Falcons now visit 2 seed Chino Hills, averaging a turbo-charged  85.4 points and holding a 78-54 victory over Poly and an 82-63 win last week over Torrey Pines neighbor San Marcos.

The Huskies’  16-14 record is the result of seven forfeit defeats early in the season, including a forfeit loss to Foothills Christian, which came up short in an Open Division game at Rancho Cucamonga Etiwanda, the state’s third-ranked team.

Coach Brad Leaf’s Foothills Knights held a one-point lead with a little more than one minute remaining, surrendered a basket, and then, in possession, could not get the shot it needed with 10 seconds left.

St. Augustine was ushered out in the Open Division, 75-61, by Torrance Bishop Montgomery.

Of the original 18 teams from the San Diego Section, three boys’ teams and three girls’ squads still are in the hunt.

La Costa Canyon, No. 1 in Boys’ Division II, faces the 22-11 Lawndale Cardinals, who defeated Redlands East Valley, 75-50.

Lawndale recently surrendered a 28-point lead in the third third quarter and 22-point advantage in the fourth and bowed to Anaheim Canyon, 105-98, in two overtimes in the Southern Section finals.

Mt. Carmel must travel to Alhambra and take on No. 1-ranked Mark Keppel in Girls’ D-II. La Jolla Country Day and The Bishop’s, seeded 1 and 2 in D-V, could be headed to a championship showdown. Pairings:

BOYS

Div.	Seed	Team	Record	Seed	Team	Record
I	6	Torrey Pines	31-3	@2	Chino Hills	16-14*
II	1	La Costa Canyon	24-7	4	Lawndale	22-11
V	6	Army-Navy	26-6	@2	L.A. Price	22-7

*Includes 7 forfeits.

GIRLS

Div.	Seed	Team	Record	Seed	Team	Record
II	4	Mt. Carmel	30-3	@1	Alhambra Mark Keppel	24-7
V	1	La Jolla Country Day	15-12	4	L.A. Ribet	24-10
V	2	The Bishop’s	23-9	3	Garden Grove Orangewood	29-4