CITY CENTRAL LEAGUE PREVIEW : Lincoln’s 7-8 Record Might Be Deceiving
Last year, before the season began, everyone figured Lincoln would be the team to beat in the City Central League. But after the Hornets concluded their preleague schedule with eight losses in 17 games, no one was so certain.
Indeed, Lincoln went on to win 10 in a row and the league championship.
The same pattern seems to be reemerging this season. The Hornets enter league play at 7-8, and now San Diego (8-2) appears poised to unseat the Hornets.
Even Lincoln Coach Ron Loneski, who can be accused of sandbagging, thinks so.
“San Diego has got to be the team to beat,” he said. “They’re going to be awful, awful tough. They are very physical and very quick.”
THE RACE
Top contenders: San Diego (16-4 in 1988), Lincoln (19-8).
Surprise potential: Madison (3-22), Hoover (5-18).
Looking to next year: Crawford (17-8).
Game of the year: Lincoln at San Diego, Feb. 15. Lincoln, which has won this game for the past six years, always has had the bigger and more physical players--until this year.
THE PLAYERS
The man: Berry Randle might need a compass--he seems to be going in the wrong direction, having transfered to Lincoln, a school that annually loses a number of highly touted athletes to other programs amid rumors of recruiting.
So finally someone moves to Lincoln, and not only does he earn a starting spot on what is consistently one of the Section’s most competitive basketball teams, but he begins league play as its highest scorer, averaging 23.6 points per game.
Randle is shooting 62% from the floor, having made 130 of 209 shots.
“He gets a lot from underneath,” Coach Ron Loneski said. “But he has a real nice jump shot, too.”
Who will fill Clark James’ shoes? No one and everyone.
James was the Section’s third-leading scorer last year, averaging 27.5 points per game for San Diego. You don’t replace someone like James with one guy, so Coach Dennis Kane isn’t going to try.
Instead, Kane will rely on the entire team.
And it’s coming through. San Diego has five players averaging double figures in scoring: J.R. Greer, Mike Watson, Marino Bowman, John McKenna and Jeff Smith.
Greer, a 6-5 senior, may prove to be the most like most James. He starred as a sophomore, but sat out last season. He now is averaging 17 points per game and nine rebounds.
Watson, 6-4, is getting 14 points and 13 rebounds per game, and Bowman, 6-2, is contributing 13 points and 10 rebounds.
Others to watch on offense: Mike Martin, a Hoover senior, is giving that school reason to believe it can compete with San Diego and Lincoln.
He’s leading the league in scoring at 24.0 points per game, which is sixth-best in the county.
Damien Mills is Hoover’s other guard. He won’t get a lot of points, but Coach John Lavery insists he’s the guy who sparks the offense.
“He handles the ball 90% of the time,” Lavery said. “And he gets the ball to Mike and everybody else. If Damien gets hurt, it would cause us just as much trouble as if Mike got hurt.”
Others to watch on defense: Lincoln’s Hosa (pronounced like Jose) Baker is only 6-foot-1, “but he plays like he’s 6-5,” Loneski said.
Baker has asked Loneski several times to be put on the other team’s best player. Every time, Loneski said, he has come through.
“You always look for a kid who wants a challenge,” Loneski continued.
Center Steve Eden, a 6-6 senior at Lincoln, is in his first year on the varsity. At the beginning of the season, Loneski wondered if Eden could do the job. He’s no longer wondering.
When Lincoln upset then-No. 1 Morse, 78-56, Eden held Darnell Cherry, Morse’s 6-10 center and among the county leaders in scoring with 19 points per game, to just six points.
THE INTANGIBLES
Sneaking up: Keep and eye on Madison, whose core is made up of guards Matt Baker and Hooney Kim, forward Don Collins, and center Deaune Boyd.
The Warhawks’ 13-man team has only six seniors. It is made up mostly of last year’s junior varsity, which went 20-5. Madison has won three consecutive gams and can’t wait to open the season Friday at home against Lincoln (7:45 p.m.).
“The confidence was kind of down at the beginning of the season,” said Paul Kubala, Madison’s assistant coach who last year coached the junior varsity. “But that was because of inexperience. With the recent wins, they’re gaining confidence. They’re playing better, practicing better and feeling better. They have decided, ‘Yeh, we can win up here with the varsity.’ ”
The preseason: San Diego lost only twice--both times to No. 2 Kearny, once by 11 points and again by one point.
Lincoln, meanwhile, enters league play with a losing record. But that’s how Loneski prefers it. The Hornets gained what Loneski thought was invaluable experience, toughening up against some of the top teams in the county (Poway, Torrey Pines, Morse) and a couple of the best teams in the country in the Above The Rim Classic (New York Monsignor McClancy, Deep Creek (Va.).
“If we have one advantage,” Loneski said, “It’s that we’ve played a lot of tough teams in the preseason.”
The season: Over the past six years, Lincoln has won 30 consecutive league games.
But that’s history. This year everyone expects the streak to snap--and for San Diego to do the snapping.
Kane, San Diego’s coach, wouldn’t go that far, but did say, “We’re capable of defeating (Lincoln). This is the most even I’ve ever felt these two teams have been.”
The postseason: Whether Lincoln continues its streak, San Diego takes first, Madison upsets both teams and Hoover upsets all three makes little difference.
When the season ends, those four schools will have a chance to win county championships in four different divisions.
That’s because the playoff structure follows state guidelines rather than county guidelines and teams advance irrespective of league standings.
San Diego has the toughest assignment--it will have to compete with the biggest schools in the county in Division I.
Lincoln will have an easy go in Division IV with the county’s smaller schools--Mountain Empire, Imperial, Holtville, Army/Navy Academy, Coronado and Clairemont.
Madison goes to the Division III playoffs with Kearny, La Jolla, Ramona, Rancho Bernardo, Santana, St. Augustine, USDHS, and West Hills.
And Hoover will be in Division II with 15 other schools.