February 27, 2025
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
So, you wanted more competitive equity in the CIF-Southern Section basketball and soccer playoffs? Look no farther as the Cerritos High and La Mirada High girls basketball teams, the John Glenn High boys soccer team and the La Mirada girls soccer team have all advanced to a divisional championship game this weekend.
DIVISION 3AA GIRLS BASKETBALL
#30 Cerritos (17-15) vs. #28 Mark Keppel High (23-9)
Friday, 4:00 p.m. @ Toyota Arena
Probable Cerritos starters: seniors Ambar Multani and Miya Scammahorn, juniors Cameron Lacorte and Mady Macaraeg and sophomore Kalana Nguyen.
In 2022, Cerritos lost to La Salle High 45-33 in the Division 3AA championship game at Cerritos. Last season, the Dons were on the short end of a 71-41 decision to Oak Park High in the 3AA finals at Edison High. Will a third time be the charm for a team who’s as hot as anyone? Cerritos, which finished in third place in the 605 League, has won nine straight games and 12 of its last 13 contests.
“I would just say that we’re blessed to get [to the finals] three times out of the last four years,” said Cerritos head coach Marcus Chinen. “With the hard work of all the girls, from the past to right now, it’s all their work. During practices, we give them the tools and what the game plan is, and they’re the ones in the end who execute it. With their hard work and dedication to the team, we find ourselves again in the finals.”
Chinen is citing the hard work from the girls as the reason the Dons are back in the championship game rather than the new system the CIF-SS put in place in which divisions are put together based off computer rankings and algorithms.
Cerritos is in the finals after defeating third-seeded Lancaster High 60-40, 19th-seeded Beaumont High 68-51, 22nd-seeded Burroughs High out of Ridgecrest 50-42 and 10th-seeded Culver City High 57-37.
“After the first game, and even the second game, you could start seeing them believe and believe,” said Chinen. “Now that we’re back here in the finals again, they’re on a mission to make it the most competitive game they can. We just told these girls that no matter what happens and whatever the outcome is on Friday, this team stuck it together and pulled something that is special. Not bad for a team that placed third in league.”
The fact that Cerritos is even in this position considering what the team has had to deal with in November and December is remarkable. Chinen has had to adjust his starting lineup almost every game until Macaraeg, a transfer from Whitney High, became eligible. Then there were the injuries or sickness to players that Chinen had to work around. Entering the quarterfinal game against Burroughs, 54 games were missed by 10 of the 14 players on the team, including the first 12 from Macaraeg. Since she became eligible, the Dons are 13-7. Because of that, Chinen admits this season has been more challenging than 2022 or last season.
“Again, we just had to put it all together,” he said. “When you said [we were] sitting with five wins [out of 19 games played], yeah, it can get to the team; it can get to sometimes the coaches because of unfamiliar territory. A lot of times, the girls would ask, ‘are we good enough, what was happening, why are we losing’? Sometimes when you get into that little funk, it’s easy to say, ‘I’m done and I don’t want to do this anymore’.”
Mark Keppel went undefeated in 10 games in the Almont League and comes into the championship game on a hot streak as well, winners of 15 straight. However, two of those victories were forfeits over Alhambra High. The path for the Aztecs included wins over #5 Long Beach Jordan High (55-23), #12 South Pasadena High (72-21), #13 Oakwood High (66-36) and #17 Chaparral High (57-32).
“They’re going to be fast; they’re going to be physical,” said Chinen of the Aztecs. “They have some really good shooters, and they cut well to the basket. It’s going to be battle; it’s going to be a challenge for us defensively. We have to know our assignments defensively. We have to make sure that we understand what their objective is and how they execute plays.”
Keira Kamida and Maile Tamaki are two of the top players Chinen has his girls focusing on, however he is quick to say that ‘you can’t just count any of them out because a lot of them do take a lot of good shots’. He also says that they don’t shoot three-pointers from the line; they shoot perimeter shots further out. This is Mark Keppel’s first appearance in a CIF-SS divisional final.
DIVISION 4A GIRLS BASKETBALL
#8 La Mirada (20-10) vs. #15 Pilibos High (16-13)
Friday, 2:00 p.m. @ Azusa Pacific University
Probable La Mirada starters: seniors Jael Arreguin, Destiny Elmore, Emily Gonzalez, Hailey Medrano and sophomore Jordin Shaw.
One of these teams will be bringing home their first CIF-SS girls basketball championship as the Matadores square off against Rose and Alex Pilibos Armenian School, the first meeting between the two. All season long, La Mirada has had a chip on its shoulders after falling to Colton High by a point in last season’s semifinals. That was the farthest any La Mirada girls basketball team had advanced and this year, head coach Victoria Luong is going even further.
“It’s huge,” said Luong. “I take it one game at a time; I don’t take anything lightly. We’ve analyzed our opponents; we’ve been watching and basing everything that we do off that. The girls are in a routine now and they’re looking strong. It’s exciting; this group of girls…last year we only had Jirah [Domingo] as a senior. So almost everybody on this team played in playoffs last year. They have that background and they’re hungry for it.”
La Mirada, the Mid-Cities League champions, have won 11 straight games and 16 of its last 18 contests. It knocked off #25 Orange High (56-42), #24 San Marino High (56-52), #16 West Covina High (46-31) and #29 University Prep (41-22). The Matadores have stuck with a consistent starting five as Arreguin, the team’s leading scorer, Elmore, Gonzalez, Medrano and Shaw have been the starters in 19 of the last 22 games. Senior Simran Sahota was a starter in the first eight games of the season.
Pilibos, which was founded in 1969, is located just north of the 101 freeway in the Little Armenia neighborhood. The Eagles finished in third place in the Liberty League and defeated #18 Duarte High (53-32), second-seeded San Jacinto Leadership Academy (52-49), seventh-seeded Warren High (39-36) and third-seeded Kennedy High (42-24) in the playoffs.
Pilibos has had somewhat of a roller-coaster season, winning its season-opener before losing three straight times. After alternating wins and losses for the next 13 games, the Eagles won four straight before ending the regular season with four straight losses. They are led by Nanar Shahinian and Lara Kasbarian, the only players to average double digits in scoring.as a team, Pilibos is scoring just over 51 points a game.
“We showed the girls film [this past Monday] and we discussed those two players and ways to stop them,” said Luong. “The assistant coach Sarah [Castillo] and I spent a significant amount of time Saturday night and Sunday watching film and coming up with plays…knowing that [Shahinian] is left-handed. The majority of girls, obviously, are right-handed, so the girls are trying to push them left. Now, it’s just training them to do the opposite and not letting [Shahinian] take that left-handed layup. If we can stop [Shahinian] and [Kasbarian], we’ll put up a good fight.”
Top-seeded Sherman Indian High and fourth-seeded Packinghouse Christian High were ousted in the first round of the playoffs and five other teams that were seeded in the top 10 did not get out of the second round. More of the same happened in the other divisions as this is the first season the CIF-SS is basing the divisions off computer rankings from this past season.
“Not knowing what this first year would look like in playoffs, I wasn’t sure,” said Luong of where her team would be put. “We were analyzing the scores across the board for quarterfinals and semifinals and a lot of the games were close. I like the equality a little bit, the balance of more competitiveness. It seems to be working.”
DIVISION 7 BOYS SOCCER
#17 Pasadena Poly High (14-3-2) @ #3 Glenn (15-9-2)
Saturday, 5:00 p.m. @ Glenn
The turnaround story of the area has to go to the Glenn boys soccer team, making its debut in a CIF-SS championship game. This is a boys soccer program that has had six winning seasons since the 2001-2002 campaign, has gone through 11 head coaches in the past 27 seasons, has been to the playoffs five times before this season and has never reached the second round before this season. Oh, the Eagles also finished in fourth place in the 605 League with a 4-6-0 record. Luis-David Enciso is in his third season as the head coach and sports a 28-32-7 record. Only Carlos Miramontes, who coached from at least the 1998-1999 season to 2004-2005 has more victories (at least 60).
Fourth place is the highest league finish for the program since the Covid-shortened season of 2020-2021 when the Eagles tied for 4th place with a 1-6-1 mark. The previous season was its last playoff appearance until now.
Glenn has scored 62 goals, allowed 29 and posted nine shutouts. Half of the games have been decided by a goal with the Eagles going 7-6 in those games. Glenn has eliminated #30 High (4-1), #14 Flintridge Prep (2-1), #6 Hawthorne Math and Science Academy (3-0) and #2 La Quinta High (2-1) in the playoffs.
Pasadena Poly is making its second trip to the finals, having defeated St. Margaret’s High 2-1 in the 2000 Division V finals. The Panthers, co-champions of the Prep League with a 5-0-1 mark, have not lost since Dec. 28, a 6-0 setback to Monrovia High. Poly has scored 63 goals, allowed 22 and blanked its opponents 10 times.
The Panthers have posted wins over #16 Samueli Academy (7-3), top-seeded Orange High (1-0), #9 Lennox Academy (4-1) and #5 Silverado High (3-2 in double overtime) prior to the championship game.
DIVISION 4 GIRLS SOCCER
#10 La Mirada (13-8-3) vs. #5 Sage Hill High (12-3-0)
Saturday, 10:30 a.m. @ Fred Kelly Stadium
La Mirada is no stranger to playing for a divisional title as the Matadores are back for the fifth time in the championship game, all coming since 2008. The Matadores may not have had their best season, but it was good enough for a third place finish in the Gateway League.
La Mirada tied arch-nemesis Mayfair High 1-1 in the 2008 Division III finals, shutout Moorpark High in the 2015 Division 4 finals, defeated Moorpark again the next season 4-1 before falling in the Division 2 finals 1-0 in 2017 to Moorpark. In 2021, the Matadores edged Saugus High 2-1 to claim the Division 2 crown.
La Mirada has tallied 30 goals and allowed 21 goals with 10 shutouts and the last two playoff wins have come via penalty kicks. The team posted playoff victories over #23 Mayfield High (2-0), #7 South Pasadena High (1-0), #31 Beaumont High (1-1, 4-2 PK) and #30 Redlands East Valley High (1-1, 5-4 PK).
Before the postseason, the longest winning streak by the Matadores was two games, accomplished three times with the last being on Jan. 21 and 23.
Sage Hill, which opened in 2000 and is making its first appearance in the finals, has won four of its last five, six of its last eight and nine of its last 12 games. The Lightning totaled 39 goals, allowed a dozen goals and has posted nine shutouts.
Sage Hill has playoff wins over #28 Linfield Christian High (2-0), #12 San Marcos High (2-1), fourth-seeded Costa Mesa High (in penalty kicks after a 1-1 regulation) and #9 Coachella Valley High (2-0). Keila Fukuda, just a freshman, leads the Lightning with 16 goals while Cambria Thomas has scored seven times.
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