Southern California Regional Girls Basketball: Windward whacks Mater Dei to stay undefeated

ONTARIO, Calif. -- Quality wins championships. Not quantity.

Windward (Los Angeles) got a total of 3 minutes, 27 seconds combined time out of its bench against a Mater Dei (Santa Ana, Calif.) team that featured a busload of players. It didn't matter one bit, because Windward's stars were undeniably amazing Saturday in an 81-71 victory in the CIF Southern California Open Division Regional Basketball Championship game at Citizens Business Bank Arena.

The Windward starters played pretty much the entire game, and while they were in there, they outraced and overpowered the Monarchs to push their record to 32-0.

"Mater Dei has a great legacy, maybe the best athletic program in the nation, and our players weren't intimidated," Wildcats coach Vanessa Nygaard said. "We are few in numbers, but we have each others' backs at every moment. We've been doing it all year. We're few but we're mighty. You have to be mature, I can't take people out if they have two fouls in the first quarter. They have the heart, they don't care if they're tired."

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Junior guard Jordin Canada was a wizard with the basketball, leaving Monarchs players in the dust all night long, dazzling the crowd. She scored 17 points and dished out an impressive 14 assists.

Senior guard Courtney Jaco was lethal from long range, connecting on six of her 12 attempts from 3-point range to finish with a game-high 26 points.

And junior center Kristen Simon was a destructive force down low, pushing her way around to earn 14 points on 7-for-12 shooting and collecting an impressive 17 rebounds.

Don't forget Macchiati Smith, whose all-around efforts produced 16 points, four rebounds and a pair of steals.

Those four were too much for Kevin Kiernan and has Mater Dei girls, the defending Division I state champions used to outrunning and outgunning their opponents.

"We really had no answer. It was a kitchen sink game, we tried everything we had and they answered every time," said Kiernan, whose program was in its 10th SoCal Regional final. "Canada orchestrated it all and they shot the ball well on a big stage. We ended up chasing them a lot."

Mater Dei still scored a lot of points, but couldn't get stops all night long. Katie Lou Samuelson led the Monarchs with 23 points and sister Karlie Samuelson added 14 to go with eight rebounds.

Windward sprinted out from the beginning, and made the Mater Dei press a moot point. It set the tone for the night, as Canada and Smith kept the ball secure and moving, while Jaco waited to nail 3-pointers and Simon made noise down low. Windward led 22-15 after the first quarter and pushed it to 43-31 at the half. The largest the lead ever got was 48-31, in the third quarter.

Every time Mater Dei thought about making a run, the Wildcats had the answer on the offensive end. Mater Dei isn't used to trying to make up double-digit deficits, and only got half the formula figured out. Only once did the Monarchs trim the margin to single digits in the second half.

"It was new but we go and act out situations like that in practice," said guard Andee Velasco, who nailed back-to-back 3-pointers in the third quarter and then hit a 3 in the fourth to mark the only time the deficit fell to single digits. "We just didn't get stops. We came back offensively."

Kiernan added that the first team tries to erase deficits in practice, simulating game situations. But the real thing is a little more difficult.

"We got stops against our second team but not Windward," he said.

After the game ended, all the talk revolved around those amazing Windward individual performances. Nobody has stopped Simon this season, and Kiernan knew coming in that it would be a problem.

"We weren't going to be the first to do it. Our Achilles Heel is rebounding and physical play in the post," he said.

Karlie Samuelson said, "She's really physical, a really good finisher. Even in double-teams she scored."

Even Simon's own coach had nothing but high praise for the dominating post player - and some for other players as well.

"No high school player can guard her. My coaches play against her in practice and they say she's got the body of a 26-year-old woman," Nygaard said about Simon. "Jordin is the only high school player I'd pay money to see. She has matured tremendously. I would expect to see her in the Olympics some day."

Now the Open Division title game is here, with Windward facing Bishop O'Dowd (Oakland) at Sleep Train Arena in Sacramento. The Wildcats may have a short bench and may be a small school, but they relish the challenge of gunning for the ultimate state title in the Golden State, their first trip to the title game in school history.

"We would have been upset if we weren't in the Open Division," Simon said. "We deserve that chance to test ourselves."

Total attendance for all six games at Citizens Business Bank Arena was 6,790.

Division I
Long Beach Poly 63,
Canyon Springs (Moreno Valley) 40
The Jackrabbits are heading to the state title game for the sixth time in program history following their convincing triumph over the Cougars at Citizens Business Bank Arena.

Poly was better than the Cougars by a decent amount in a lot of departments, and when it all was totaled up, it was a win worthy of a trip to Sacramento.

The Jackrabbits shot 42 percent compared to 30 percent for Canyon Springs, won the rebounding battle 35-30, won the turnover battle 22-15 and ripped off 15 steals compared to eight for the opposition. They led 15-11 after one quarter then went on a 20-10 binge in the second quarter to get comfortably ahead.

Tania Lamb scored 16 points on 5-for-8 shooting to lead Poly, and Jada Matthews added 10 points. Briana Johnson and Keyla Morgan each scored nine points and Airica Carmon had eight. Eleven different Poly players collected at least one rebound, and eight players took at least one steal.

For Canyon Springs, Cheyenne Greenhouse led the team in scoring with 14 points and added nine rebounds plus three steals, and Ashleigh Sparks added 11 points. Charnea Johnson Chapman pulled in 10 rebounds.

Poly will face Berkeley in the final, a school making its 12th trip to a state final.

Division II
Lynwood 60, Ridgeview (Bakersfield) 42
The Knights are heading back to the state title game for the fifth time. Their blowout victory at Citizens Business Bank Arena evened their regional final record at 5-5.

It wasn't very close, as the Southern Section II-AA champions used their full-court press to harass Ridgeview into 22 turnovers (with 14 steals) and built a 15-7 lead after one quarter and then a 36-14 edge at halftime. Lynwood was led by a three-headed monster of Alize Lofton (16 points, seven assists and nine rebounds), Amber Blockmon (15 points and nine rebounds) and Priscilla Lopez (15 points).

The Lynwood defense held Ridgeview to just five first-half field goals and 26.8-percent shooting overall.

Ridgeview, the Central Section champion, beat Lynwood earlier this season, but was overwhelmed in the early going. Erica Mccall did score 19 points but it was on 8-for-25 shooting. She did pull down 11 rebounds. Teammate Candace Wilkerson scored 13 points and added 10 rebounds in the team's first trip to a regional final.

Lynwood will battle St. Francis (Mountain View) for the state title in Sacramento.

Division III
Alemany (Mission Hills) 60, Chaminade (West Hills) 47
The boys made it last year, and now the Alemany girls are headed to the state title game for the second time in program history.

The Warriors shot a lower percentage than Chaminade but forced 24 turnovers to more than make up for it at Colony High School. The Eagles shot 38 percent and Alemany shot 35.8. But Alemany gave it away 16 times and that was key. That, and the free throw disparity. Alemany was 19-for-35 and Chaminade was 6-for-9.

Alemany got 15 points each from Leslie Lopez-Wood and Hannah Johnson (nine rebounds) to beat its Mission League counterpart. The teams split their two league meetings earlier this season.

Chaminade was led by 12 points from Cassie MacLeod and 11 from Valerie Higgins. Natalie Valenzuela blocked three shots.

Alemany will match up against Sacred Heart Cathedral (San Francisco) in the final.

Division IV
Serra (Gardena) 63, St. Bernard (Playa del Rey) 54
The Cavaliers (28-6) finally got the monkey off their backs and are making their first trip to the state final in three tries. And they did it against a very familiar foe from the Del Rey League.

The win at Colony High School came thanks to forcing 17 turnovers and getting 24 points from Siera Thompson plus 13 points from Caila Hailey on 3-for-4 shooting from 3-point land. It also helped that Serra shot 65 percent from the free throw line compared to 31 percent for the Vikings. Serra didn't get any scoring from its bench, but obviously didn't need any.

For St. Bernard, it was a balanced attack. Lajahna Drummer and Chenelle Pelle each scored 13 points to share top honors on the team, with Pelle grabbing 14 rebounds and Drummer ripping down 10. Demoria White added 11 points and five assists.

Serra was the Southern Section IV-AA runner up but got a huge boost when Windward was selected for the Open Division. St. Bernard also was in IV-AA and lost to Windward in the section semifinals.

The teams split their two league meetings, meaning a shared league title. Looks like Serra got the ultimate prize: A date with Salesian (Richmond) in the state final.

Division V
Sierra Canyon (Chatsworth) 63, Horizon (San Diego) 62
The Trailblazers escaped Colony High School's gym with their first state title game berth in school history.

Kennedy Burke was a monster for Sierra Canyon (26-9), racking up 24 rebounds and 28 points in the winning effort. Another monster was Cheyanne Wallace, who added 20 points and 18 rebounds. Nobody else pulled down more than four rebounds, and Zoe Goss scored 18 points for Sierra Canyon, the Southern Section Division V-AA champions.

Horizon led 59-58 late in the game but the Trailblazers were able to take the lead back and ride out the victory, setting up a matchup in Sacramento next week against perennial power Pinewood (Los Altos Hills).

For Horizon (26-8), the San Diego Section D-V champs, Dijonai Carrington led the way with 24 points and Janae Omusi added 12 points to go with a team-high 10 rebounds.

Horizon jumped out to a 22-14 lead after one quarter but it was met with a 21-8 outburst from the Trailblazers in the second quarter. From there it was a tight contest.