Mater Dei Receives Top Seeding

Mater Dei is the lone county team to be top-seeded in the Southern Section boys’ basketball playoffs as it attempts to win consecutive section and state championships for the first time.

But that doesn’t mean the county was not well represented when the pairings were released Sunday. More than 50 teams received automatic or at-large berths in 10 divisions.

The first game involving an area team is Wednesday, when Corona del Mar (15-10) plays host to West Hills Chaminade (13-14) in a Division III-A wild-card game. The winner travels to La Canada for a first-round game Friday.

Mater Dei, which has won 27 straight since its season-opening loss to Mouth of Wilson (Va.) Oak Hill Academy, will start its Division I-A title quest against Santa Ana (12-12).

Coach Gary McKnight, concerned the Monarchs have not regained “the peak we reached in [December’s] Las Vegas tournament,” said although repeating as champions is possible, nothing is certain.

“Our goal at the beginning of the year was to win [Southern Section],” McKnight said. “We set for ourselves the hope of getting a No. 1 seed. But anything can happen in the playoffs. In 1991 we were supposed to breeze to the title and nearly lost to Irvine in the first round.”

More highlights from Sunday’s pairings:

* Six other county teams are seeded besides Mater Dei. Esperanza, Tustin and Cypress are seeded second in the I-AA, II-A and II-AA divisions; Sonora is third-seeded in Division III-AA; and Santa Margarita and Estancia are fourth-seeded in the II-AA and III-A divisions.

* All six South Coast League teams got in. Mater Dei, Capistrano Valley and San Clemente received automatic berths; Dana Hills, Mission Viejo and Trabuco Hills received at-large berths.

“I had a good feeling about us,” said Trabuco Hills Coach Rainer Wulf, who was among the first to arrive at the section’s Cerritos office to get pairing announcements. “When you have a 32-team bracket, you can’t fill it without a lot of qualifiers. I figured most of the county teams with 10 wins would get in.”

* It appears the selection committee was determined to regionalize playoff games as much as possible to reduce travel, at least in the first round. In the Friday games, 18 county teams play each other.

* Villa Park, which plays host to Trabuco Hills, is celebrating its first (Century) league title and playoff spot in 20 years. “This is the first winning season we’ve had since 1975-76,” Coach Kevin Reynolds said. “It’s been a long dry spell.” Convinced his team would play the Mustangs, Reynolds had staff members scout their last two games.

* COMPLETE PAIRINGS: C15