CCS basketball playoffs: Best of Wednesday’s pool play finales
A buzzer-beater decided the first game. Double overtime was needed to determine the second.
What will happen in the third?
As if the stakes weren’t high enough, top-seeded Archbishop Riordan and second-seeded St. Ignatius will bring emotional history to their Central Coast Section Open Division championship game on Friday night at USF.
Riordan won the first two games between the West Catholic Athletic League rivals this season but just barely.
Both teams advanced to the final by winning their respective divisions in the section’s Open Division pool play format.
Riordan capped a 3-0 run through Pool A on Wednesday with a 68-45 rout at home of Bellarmine. St. Ignatius went 3-0 in Pool B, completing its run with a 65-56 win at home over Archbishop Mitty.
So now the stage is officially set for Round 3 in their trilogy.
Anthony D’Acquisto had 20 points for SI in its win over Mitty. Noah Kirsch-Lopez added 12 points, Ty Landers had 11 and Raymond Whitley finished with 10.
Mitty tried to stay within striking distance. The visitors trailed 21-17 after the first quarter and 32-25 at halftime. They were still within single digits going to the final period.
Joseph Seifu led the Monarchs with 18 points. Danny Ryan added 10.
Riordan will be appearing in its 25th CCS final and seeking its 19th championship. The Crusaders have won the past two Open championships, including last season’s over SI, and three of the past four.
SI has won seven CCS titles in 15 previous appearances, with its most recent championship coming in Division III in 2020. It has not won an Open title since the section added the division in 2013.
– Darren Sabedra
GIRLS
Mitty overpowers SI, aims for more hardware: The Mitty team profile summary on the social media platform X says it all: Thirty-three time CCS champions, 17-time NorCal champions and six-time state champions.
The standards are high for the storied San Jose program, and the current team is meeting the challenges and expectations game after game.
Wednesday, Mitty advanced to the Open final with a 66-28 victory at home over St. Ignatius. In three pool-play games during the CCS playoffs, not a single opponent reached 30 points against the Monarchs.
McKenna Woliczko scored 20 points to lead Mitty on Wednesday. The Monarchs also got 12 points from Tee McCarthy and 11 from Maliya Hunter as they improved to 25-2.
– Darren Sabedra
Riordan senior catches fire to reach Open final: Riordan coach Will Watkins called it one of the most exciting moments he’s ever seen as a coach.
With the game tied in the fourth quarter, 5-foot-5 senior Chloe Yan put the Crusaders on her back. Yan scored all 17 of her points during a three-minute stretch in the final period to lead Riordan to a 53-40 road win over Priory and send the San Francisco school to the CCS Open Division title game against Mitty on Friday at USF.
“It was one of the most exciting things I’ve witnessed as a coach,” Watkins said. “The last time we played at Priory was her freshman year when we weren’t even eligible for playoffs. It was the last game of our independent season. We went down there and won. And for her to still be on the team and have a moment like that in her senior year is really, really cool.”
Riordan snapped Priory’s 15-game winning streak that dated back to Jan. 3. The Crusaders are now winners of their last six games and have beaten their three pool play opponents by an average margin of 25.3 points.
Wednesday’s win means that both Riordan’s boys and girls teams will be in the CCS Open finals. Watkins said it’s a dream come true for the school’s basketball community.
“I grew up going to Riordan home games, I’m class of 1999,” Watkins said. “All I’ve been trying to do is replicate the great basketball before me, and it just happens to be at the same time that coach Joey Curtin is doing a phenomenal job on the boys side. I owe a lot of the success to my relationship with him as well. It’s a very exciting time and I’m really happy to be leading the girls program.”
But now comes the hard part.
On Friday, the Crusaders will be heavy underdogs against WCAL power Mitty. Riordan lost to the Monarchs 76-29 in their first matchup and then 74-37 a few weeks later. Since 2024, Riordan has lost to Mitty eight straight times, all blowouts.
Watkins said his message to his team is for his players to play without fear.
“I want them to actually embrace and enjoy those games, primarily because there’s no pressure on us,” Watkins said. “They’re a phenomenal program, a phenomenal team, and you know, they’re the ones who are supposed to win, right? So you just get a certain freedom from you to give your best effort, and you live with the results.”
– Nathan Canilao