High schools: Clovis West girls basketball hits the road; Clovis North soccer hosts
Fresh off an 11th straight Central Section high school girls basketball title, Clovis West is the No. 3 seed in the CIF Open Division Northern California regional that gets going this week.
The Golden Eagles will visit No. 2 Archbishop Mitty-San Jose in the regional semifinals on Saturday in the six-team Open bracket.
“Mitty at full strength is really, really good,” Clovis West coach Craig Campbell said following the Golden Eagles’ 54-42 win over Clovis.
Archbishop Mitty won its 31st Central Coast Section title. Five-star recruit Morgan Cheli, who Campbell helped coach in the summer on a travel team, missed most of the season because of an injury but is back.
The Monarchs feature many players over 6 feet.
The game is a rematch of last season’s regional semifinal, won by Archbishop Mitty 53-45.
Other Fresno-area teams will play this week in Division I-V regional 16-team brackets beginning with first-round games Tuesday. Quarterfinals are Thursday, semifinals Saturday and finals March 7. Games tip off at 7 p.m.
The state finals are March 10-11 at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento.
Boys basketball
Clovis West is the top seed in Division I and will host No. 16 St. Ignatius College-San Francisco and Clovis North is the No. 7 seed and will host No. 10 San Ramon Valley.
The Golden Eagles lost to St. Joseph in the Division I section final; St. Joseph is the No. 3 seed in the NorCal Open Division.
▪ Division II: San Joaquin Memorial is the sixth seed and will host No. 11 Santa Cruz in NorCal.
▪ Division IV: Kingsburg is the No. 13 seed and will visit No. 4 Monterey in NorCal. The Vikings won the D-III Central Section title. In the SoCal bracket, No. 16 Tulare Western will face top-seed Valencia, while No. 5 Porterville will host No. 12 Beaumont. Tulare Western won the section D-IV title. Porterville lost in the D-II final to Arroyo Grande.
▪ Division V: No. 5 Sierra will host No. 12 Gridley in NorCal. The Chieftains lost to Kingsburg in the D-III final. Also in NorCal, No. 6 Kerman will host No. 11 Vacaville Christian and No. 14 Madera South will travel to No. 3 Ripon Christian. Madera South is fresh off a D-V section title.
Girls basketball
▪ Division I: Clovis is the fifth seed and will host No. 12 Vanden-Fairfield and No. 9 Buchanan will travel to face No. 8 Bishop O’Dowd-Oakland.
▪ Division II: No. 4 Central will host No. 13 St. Francis-Sacramento, while No. 11 San Joaquin Memorial will play No. 6 Whitney-Rocklin.
▪ Division III: No. 9 Caruthers will visit. No. 8 Evergreen Valley-San Jose and No. 12 Clovis East will play No. 5 Granada-Livermore.
▪ Division IV: In the SoCal bracket, No. 6 Porterville hosts Notre Dame Academy-Los Angeles.
▪ Division V: In NorCal, section D-V winner Reedley is the 15th seed and will visit No. 2 Santa Cruz. No. 14 Tulare Union will go to No. 3 Bret Harte-Angels Camp. In SoCal, Lindsay is the 16th seed and will play top-seeded Gahr-Cerritos. Lindsay won the D-VI section title.
Soccer: Clovis North doubleheader
No. 2 Clovis North won the Central Section Division I title and will get another home match and hope to continue its undefeated season whey the Broncos face No. 7 Vintage-Napa.
The match will begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
The No. 4-seed Clovis North girls will also play at home, at 4:30 p.m., against No. 7 Menlo-Atherton.
The Broncos defeated Liberty-Bakersfield for the D-I section title.
The CIF soccer postseason is one week culminating at the region level. Semifinals are Thursday and finals are Saturday.
Boys
▪ Division III: No. 2 McLane hosts No. 7 Lincoln-San Jose at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday.
Girls
▪ Division IV: No. 4 Exeter hosts No. 5 Mira Monte at 5 p.m. Tuesday. Exeter won the section D-III title.
▪ Division V: If McLane wins on Tuesday, the Highlanders will be the fifth seed and play No. 4 Stone Ridge Christian-Merced at 5 p.m. Wednesday.
