Ballesteros Charges Back in Time to Lead Mater Dei : Prep basketball: Twice injured, senior guard returns to help Monarchs’ quest for another title.

J.J. Ballesteros, in full flight on the left wing, swept toward the basket. He jumped. A defender moved into his path.

Ballesteros released the ball, and an instant later, he and the defender crashed to the floor.

Watching the scrimmage from midcourt, Gary McKnight, Mater Dei High School basketball coach, cringed.

“Who took that charge?” McKnight demanded, not really caring who as long as it didn’t happen again. “Don’t you know how valuable J.J. is? We can’t have him hurt. Not now. Just let him have the basket. Get out of his way.”

Odd words for most basketball coaches, who usually love to see their players drawing offensive fouls.

But there was a method to McKnight’s madness.

On another day, with another team, McKnight might have stopped practice to applaud the play.

But not on the morning before Mater Dei’s second-round Southern Section Division I-A playoff game against Arroyo.

More than his 15-point scoring average, Mater Dei needs Ballesteros to, in his words, “keep everybody together.”

Twice, Mater Dei has lost Ballesteros to injury or illness. And twice, he’s been able to bounce back. A third time might be asking too much.

Mater Dei without Ballesteros is young and inexperienced. Mater Dei with Ballesteros is still young and inexperienced.

A 6-foot-1 guard, Ballesteros is one of only six seniors on the Monarchs’ 14-man roster, and one of only four varsity letter-winners.

That’s why McKnight was saying this would be a rebuilding season at Mater Dei.

No, really. He acknowledged he’d said that before and still gone on to win section championships in the past, but this time he meant it. There was absolutely no way Mater Dei would repeat as state Division I champions. And a seventh section championship in nine seasons was unlikely.

Certainly, his players believed him.

“He told us we’d struggle at first,” Ballesteros said. “That he wouldn’t take it out on us. That he understood.”

McKnight was banking heavily on Ballesteros to lead Mater Dei. But then again, he wasn’t sure how it would turn out.

Last season, Ballesteros played a grand total of one game before coming down with mononucleosis and missing the rest of the season.

So, he watched more than he played. He knew the system, but he hadn’t actually performed under game conditions. He traveled to Oakland for the state title game, but again he hadn’t actually played.

He would be counted on to teach the younger players, while learning himself.

During summer league play, Ballesteros looked strong, shooting well in July. But in August he was ill and didn’t play as well.

“(The mono) still flares up,” Ballesteros said. “When it does, I stop and don’t do anything.”

Last year, he wasn’t as careful and the mono lingered.

“I never could sit down for a month,” he said. “I kept trying to cheat. I kept trying to play and it wouldn’t go away.”

Talented but unproven players had gone on to lead Mater Dei in the past, and maybe McKnight saw a little bit of Mark Ramstack when he looked at Ballesteros.

Ramstack was a steady point guard on Mater Dei’s 1987-88 team, which lost the Angelus League championship to Bishop Amat but bounced back to beat the Lancers for the 5-A championship.

Ramstack played on the junior varsity before finally moving up to the varsity his senior season.

Like the ‘87-88 team, McKnight figured his current team would come on strong at the end, even if he wasn’t saying it publicly.

“I was confident,” Ballesteros said. “I knew it would take a few losses to get us going.

“Plus, the way the system is set up, the coaches don’t throw everything at you at once. You might be behind in December, but by January and February we’re catching up and getting better and better.”

A few losses and a couple of near-misses later, Mater Dei (23-4) is rolling. The Monarchs won the Angelus League championship and earned the No. 1 seeding in the I-A playoffs, which began Friday.

Funny as it may sound, Ballesteros said a loss to Servite and a couple of close calls against Capistrano Valley and Santa Margarita were keys to turning the season around.

“We won the Capo game, but we were up by 12 with two or three minutes left to go,” he said. “We ended up winning by one point. That shouldn’t have happened. And Servite, that shouldn’t have happened.”

Mater Dei matured in a hurry at Santa Margarita. An overflow crowd jammed the Eagles’ gym and the din was deafening at times. But thanks to a 27-point performance by Ballesteros, Mater Dei pulled away for a 76-61 victory.

“The only thing I worried about coming into that game was the crowd,” Ballesteros said. “I wondered how we’d play in front of a big crowd. We responded well.”

But just as the season was winding down, Ballesteros injured his right hand--his shooting hand--punching a gymnasium wall. “I was angry,” he said.

He didn’t think much of it until the hand began to swell.

“He came into the office looking like Napoleon Bonaparte,” McKnight said, trying to show how Ballesteros hid his hand.

X-rays showed no broken bones, but the swelling persisted and Ballesteros thought it might be an infection of some kind. Finally, after missing one game and almost a week of practice, it was diagnosed as an inflammation of his knuckle joints.

Ballesteros returned Friday night to score 20 points in Mater Dei’s 75-57 first-round victory over Rubidoux.

And now, just when Mater Dei needs him most, Ballesteros is finally feeling back to normal.