St. Clair Works Hard to Get Sonora a Title : Freeway League: Senior point guard spends hours practicing. He hopes it pays off with a championship season.

The CIF Southern Section honor roll adorning the Sonora High School gymnasium wall reads like a who’s who of North Orange County prep basketball.

Southern Section Division 2-A player of the year Dave Meyers (Class of ‘71), forward Dave Knudsen (Class of ‘76) and brothers Jon (Class of ‘83) and Eric Samuelson (‘84) are pictured above the entrance to the gymnasium.

But there’s been a void since Eric Samuelson graduated and Sonora has failed to win a league title since 1982. That could change this season.

Point guard Chris St. Clair, a 6-foot senior, is not only a likely candidate for the wall of fame but could also help end Sonora’s league championship drought.

St. Clair figures to improve upon his 21.4-point and 4.9-assist averages last season after a training schedule that would make Body by Jake proud.

St. Clair routinely does 500 sit-ups and 250 pushups a day. During the summer, he worked out twice a week at the North Orange County Rehabilitation Center to improve his vertical leaps and quickness, and also ran or hopped up and down the Fullerton High football stadium steps three times a week.

What’s more, St. Clair made his own pair of strength improvement shoes, attaching a large rubber plate to the front soles of his shoes and then did 10 exercise routes for an hour each day.

“I have never, ever, coached a player who worked this hard,” Sonora Coach Mike Murphy said. “Chris is the ultimate gym rat. Besides his workouts, he seems like he plays basketball 23 hours a day.”

Or so it seems.

Every night, St. Clair turns on the lights on his outdoor court and practices his free throws. The nightly full-court games with neighbor Tony Iannole and friends last summer were running so late that neighbors sometimes called the police.

St. Clair spends his lunch period and an hour before practice in the Sonora gymnasium working on his shooting. The dividends are now evident: a range of up to three feet beyond the three-point line and a green light from Murphy to shoot any time.

“Chris has always been a good ballhandler, but I think he’s improved his defense tremendously since last year,” Murphy said.

Summer was one long basketball game for St. Clair and his teammates. Sonora played in tournaments in Santa Barbara, Palm Springs and San Diego. The Raiders also played in leagues at Esperanza and Katella.

“I think Chris will average 25 to 28 points per game this year, but he doesn’t have to score for us to win,” Murphy said. “In his best game last summer, he only scored 15 points against San Dieguito.”

St. Clair said he enjoys an up-tempo game to a certain extent and wants the ball with the game on the line.

“I like making a good pass as much as hitting a jump shot,” he said.

St. Clair didn’t join a traveling club team until the eighth grade and credits his brother, Scott, for teaching him the game. Scott is four years older, three inches taller and starts at the University of La Verne, but Chris claims he holds his own against him in one-on-one games.

“Scott is my motivation,” he said. “I’ve always looked up to him. He pushes me to be my best. And I just started beating him in one-on-one games this year.”

St. Clair’s mother, Sheila, is a property management officer in Huntington Beach. She has raised two sons, and St. Clair calls his mother and an uncle, John St. Clair, his biggest fans.

“The biggest thing my mother taught me was how to organize my time,” he said. “I always try to get my school work done before playing any basketball.”

St. Clair has a 3.1 grade-point average and scored 810 points on his Scholastic Aptitude Test. His goal is to receive a Division I college scholarship, but thus far has received letters from only Oregon State, Vanderbilt and Wyoming.

But the immediate goal is winning the Freeway League title and adding a league championship banner to Sonora’s wall of fame.

“My sophomore year, we only won six games and last year we improved to 15 victories,” St. Clair said. “This year, our goal is to win 20 games and get a league title.”

Sonora is the favorite to win the league title with three returning starters, but Troy Coach T.J. Hardeman says St. Clair separates Sonora from the rest of the league.

“I think you could put St. Clair on any team in our league and they would be the favorite to win it all,” Hardeman said.