mater616

SoCalHoops High School & Prep Report

Have A Mater Nice Dei--(June 16, 1998)

For the past several evenings, I've been watching some tape of previous Mater Dei teams sent to me by Mr. Sixth Man, Tom Wedmore, of Shaun Jackson, Schea Cotton, Gary McKnight's son, and a bunch of the other "old" Mater Dei teams from seasons long ago. . . gosh, it doesn't really seem like 1993-94 was that long ago, but it's actually four years now. . . great stuff, and thanks Tom. Jackson was certainly a more versatile player than Cotton, at least the season they won the State title, but then every shot Cotton made that season was a slam-dunk-hang-from the rim, sort of in-your-face type of shot. Wonder what he's going to do next year? Word is that he will be filing suit against the NCAA, at least according to our sources, but if no preliminary injunction is issued by mid-summer then look for Cotton to perhaps enroll at a JC just to continue to maintain his eligibility. . . and his game. . . something he might have considered in the first instance two years ago.

And since we're talking about things Mater Dei, here's a reminder announcement about the first of two Mater Dei Tournaments. This one starts tomorrow, June 18, 1998, and this is the "Mater Dei Tournament", not to be confused with the "Mater Dei Nike Tournament" which follows next week. We've already done a bit about the brackets and the teams coming, so if you need further reminding, then check out the story we did on "Mater Dei & Mater Dei Nike Tournaments June 18-20 & 24-27--(May 13, 1998)".

And finally, we couldn't help but notice that yesterday the Times' Orange County Edition sportswriters, Paul McCleod and Mike Terry wrote short columns about their "most memorable" events of the 1997-98 high school athletic season, and not surprisingly both of them wrote about basketball teams. McCleod's article had nothing to do with Mater Dei, but instead focused on Narbonne High, and the reasons that McCleod all along suspected that something was wrong in Denmark so to speak, with the residency of three of the girls' team players. Ultimately, as we all know by now, these and other violations resulted in Narbonne forfeiting its LA City Section 4A title, and probably it's Southern Section and State Championships as well.

Terry's article was also about Mater Dei, and even though it wasn't particularly flattering to "the program", it still is a recognition that Mater Dei has one of the finest sports programs in SoCal if not the country. Because the article may be inaccessible to some, and in any event a link to the article goes stale in a day or two, we're going to reprint the article in it's entirety here ("Fair Use"), solely for educational purposes. Remember, if you can, go out and spend a quarter for the paper, it's well worth it. Here's the story:

Members of the Times Orange County prep sports staff share their
memories of the people, events and issues of the past school year.
By MIKE TERRY

The buzz around the county began during the summer. This is the year to get Mater Dei in basketball. The Monarchs are small. They're young. The mystique is gone. Try convincing the other five teams in the South Coast League of that. The Monarchs, under Coach Gary McKnight, had not lost a game in league play since entering the South Coast in the 1992-93 season. Their last league loss was in the Angelus opener against Servite in 1991. They had won 71 league games in a row. But cracks in the Monarchs' basketball fortress were showing. Santa Margarita had upended Mater Dei in the Orange Holiday tournament final, handing the Monarchs their first defeat by a county opponent since they fell to Marina in the 1991 Southern Section Division I-A semifinals.

In earlier nonleague games last season, Mater Dei lost to Santa Barbara San Marcos in the San Luis Obispo tournament and to Long Beach Jordan and Perris in the Ocean View tournament. Yet there was nothing to suggest something unusual was brewing on Jan. 17, 1998, when Dana Hills and Mater Dei squared off in the Bren Center at UC Irvine. "We felt going in they were young and that we were a more physical team," Dana Hills Coach Mark Thornton said. "In practice we told the kids, 'If you go to the [basket], take it strong,' " Thornton said. He also asked them to be aggressive on defense and to rebound.

Although McKee blocked the first three Mater Dei shots, the Monarchs led, 24-14, with about a minute left in the first half. Then the Dolphins got a huge lift. "With a minute to go, [forward] Todd Pittman had two steals and scored both times to bring us within six at half," Thornton said. "With that momentum I felt we could catch them, hold them off and beat them down the stretch."

That's exactly what happened. Pittman scored 17 of his game-high 26 points in the second half. The Dolphins sank 14 of their 21 second-half shots (after going eight for 25 in the first half) and pressured the Monarchs into committing 24 turnovers and missing 34 of 47 shots for the game. When it was over the Dolphins had won, 43-46. "We didn't think about 'the streak,' " Thornton said. "We just wanted to win a league game. I knew Mater Dei had not lost in South Coast, but we didn't bring it up [in practice]." It would be nice to say that the biggest victory in their 27 years of playing basketball propelled Dana Hills to greater things. But the Dolphins finished third in league.

Mater Dei finished tied with Capistrano Valley for yet another title. The Monarchs beat Dana Hills, 37-35, in the rematch at Dana Hills. Nonetheless, the memory of that game won't fade soon. "Whenever you beat a Gary McKnight team you've done something because they are always good and always prepared," Thornton said. "My kids played well that night and deserved to win. But it was a big-time accomplishment by Mater Dei to go that long without a loss. We won one; they won 71."