Vikings, Oilers open postseason tonight

Mike Sciacca, Independent

When the Marina High girls basketball team defeated Huntington

Beach last Friday night in a one-game playoff to determine the

third-place finisher in the Sunset League, only then did Vikings Coach

Butch Fredlow began to set his sights on the CIF Southern Section

playoffs.

In just his first year as head coach, Fredlow has guided Marina to yet

another postseason berth. He was happy for that, but he wanted a little

bit more.

“I’m hoping that, with Marina’s tradition in girls basketball, we are

able to host a first round game Thursday,” Fredlow said after the

Huntington Beach game. “That would be nice.”

Fredlow’s wish was granted, as he found out last Sunday when the Southern

Section office in Cerritos released the boys and girls basketball

pairings: Marina would host Sunny Hills in a Division I-A first round

match up.

Tonight’s playoff game tips off at 7:30 p.m.

“I’m happy with the match up, and that we got a home game out of it, to

boot,” Fredlow said. “I really like the spot we’re in.”

In Sunny Hills, Marina (18-9) will be taking on a Lancer team that went

11-15 overall and qualified for the playoffs as an at-large entry out of

the Freeway League.

The Lancers tied La Habra for third place in the Freeway League, which

was won handily by Troy (23-3), the division’s second seed, behind

top-seeded J.W. North of Riverside.

“They (Sunny Hills) know what it’s like to face a good basketball team

(Troy), and we come from a league (Sunset) that always tough to win,”

Fredlow said. “We’ve been playing well lately as a team and I hope that

can carry over into the playoffs.”

Sunny Hills returned nine players from a 1998-99 squad that also went

11-15, and is led by two seniors, guard Kim MacKeand and 5-foot-9 forward

Jessica Perez. MacKeand, one of the Lancers’ key players, is the team

leader in free throw percentage (74-percent), but it’s junior guard

Kristen Fong who tops the Sunny Hills scoring chart.

Fong dropped in 17 points last Thursday in a 52-39 victory over

Fullerton, a win that brought the Lancers into a third-place tie with La

Habra.

Marina, which ended the season with wins over Los Alamitos and Huntington

Beach, is led by senior starters Nikki Lee, Jun Okazoe, and Amy Wheeler.

A win tonight would move Marina, which reached the quarterfinal round

last year and won a Southern Section title two years ago, into a Saturday

game with Mission Valley League champion Arroyo (15-11), which drew a first round bye.

Back on Feb. 5, Arroyo suffered a nonleague home loss to Huntington Beach

which, two days earlier, had scored a key overtime victory over Marina.

As for Huntington Beach, the Oilers (14-13) take on El Dorado (15-11)

tonight in Placentia.

The Golden Hawks, who finished third overall in the Empire League, are

led by a pair of quick guards in Melissa Jacob and Smadar Bezalel.

One of El Dorado’s 11 losses this season was a double-digit defeat to

Marina back in December.

Huntington Beach still made the playoffs despite playing a majority of

the season without sophomore forward Kelsey Ball, who figured to be one

of the Oilers’ key players. Ball, who now plays the role of cheerleader

on the Huntington bench, has been held out of action due to a ankle

injury.

But picking up the slack -- and then some -- has been another talented

Oiler sophomore, 5-10 guard Amy Sanders.

Sanders, a transfer from Mater Dei, is one of the top scorers in the

county with a 22.4 average. Sanders also is a key rebounder, as well,

with 10 per game, and is steady from the foul line at 77-percent.

Huntington Beach, however, does not enter the playoffs of a high note,

having dropped its final three games of the regular season. El Dorado,

too, will attempt to rebound from a 46-32 loss to Cypress last Thursday

in a game that determined the second place finisher in the Empire League.