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Mustangs, Kings in CCS basketball semi's
By Dick Sparrer
It took an impressive second-half rally to do it, but the Homestead girls basketball team has won its way into the Central Coast Section Division II semifinals for a third straight season.
The Mustangs, 19-7 for the year, pulled out a 49-46 come-from-behind victory over Soquel last Saturday night to advance to the semi's this week against No. 1 seed Pinewood (25-2).
The clubs will collide on Feb. 28, 6 p.m., at Mount Pleasant High School in east San Jose with the winner advancing to the CCS championship game against the St. Francis (21-6)-Leland (22-3) semifinal winner. The title game will be played March 3, 6 p.m., at the San Jose State University Events Center.
The Mustangs are certainly no strangers to the CCS finals. Homestead is gunning for a third straight section championship in the division.
At least for a half last Saturday, it appeared that the Mustangs were on their way out of the CCS playoffs. The Mustangs were down 18-6 after a period and 29-18 at intermission against Soquel. But Homestead came on to outscore the Knights 14-6 in the third quarter and 17-11 in the fourth to win by three.
Senior guard Charlene Jarrett buried three three-pointers on her way to an 18-point night to lead the Mustangs to the impressive victory.
Solid senior forward Julia Randall came through with 14 points for the Mustangs. Mandy Wald added seven points, Tanya Green four and Stephanie Malcolm, Sabrina Gauthier and Janelle Kitasoe hit two each.
Homestead had opened the week with a solid 60-40 win over Wilcox (16-12) in the first round of the playoffs.
Green and Randall were the leaders in the win, and that certainly came as no surprise to Homestead head coach Wade Nakamura, who considered the two seniors as his leaders coming into the season.
Green, a 5-foot-10 senior forward, led the Mustangs with 19 points in the win. The four-year varsity player and comeback all-leaguer has already signed a full scholarship at UOP.
Randall, 6-foot-1, supported with 18 points for the Mustangs. She is a three-year varsity player who is another comeback all-leaguer for Homestead.
Jarrett pitched in 13 points to join the others in twin figures. She had a three-pointer among her six field goals.
Gauthier and Pavla Mikula chipped in with four points apiece for the winners and Malcolm added two points.
Local teams fall
The girl teams at Fremont and the boys teams at Homestead and Fremont all lost in playoff action last week.
The Fremont boys beat South San Francisco 52-43 in their CCS Division II opener before falling to Salinas 83-35 in the quarterfinals on Saturday night.
Troy Tulowitzski, Fremont's top scorer all season long, poured in 20 points to lead the Firebirds to the win over South San Francisco to open the playoffs.
Glenn Marasigan pumped in 13 points in the win, including a three-pointer. Jesse Enchill added seven points and Jacob Esau hit six.
The 'Birds, 21-7 for the year, lost a lopsided 83-35 decision to Salinas last Saturday to fall out of the playoffs. Tulowitzski led the Firebirds with 13 points, including a three.
Marasigan chipped in with eight points and Renato Castro had a three among his seven points.
The Homestead boys lost a 34-33 heartbreaker to Santa Clara in the first round of the CCS Division II playoffs.
Brad Sasaki finished his junior season with a 12-point night. He had a couple of threes among his three field goals and he added four points at the free-throw line.
Garren Strong, a sophomore, ended up in double digits with 10 points. Taylor Carpenter had four points, John McGaughlin and Bryan Silverman hit three each and Randy Chang had one.
The Mustangs finished the year 15-13.
The Fremont girls, meanwhile, dropped their CCS Division II opener 63-55 to Soquel. The Lady Birds finished the year 14-12.
Daynelle Parker and Katrina Ison pitched in 14 points apiece and Leanne Bautista added 13, but Fremont lost by eight to Soquel. Ison hit a pair of threes in the game.
Sara Harvey supported with seven points for Fremont, including a three, Tiana Stroughter had four points and Rachel Saldivar hit three points.
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
