Players breaking a state record like 102 points for one game tend to get enough attention so player of the week honors go to others on purpose. We have honorees this week from all corners of the state, including one from a small town up north. They are from Portola and San Anselmo for Northern California and San Juan Capistrano and Camarillo in Southern California.
We hope you enjoy this free post on Cal-Hi Sports.com. For our state rankings packages in boys and girls basketball plus State Stat Stars of the Week, state record updates and special features, please check out our Gold Club membership today. If you’re not a member, CLICK HERE.
CHECK OUT CALGAMESWANTED.COM
Created for Coaches by Coaches for California Varsity High School Head Coaches and Athletic Directors, Start building your schedule with CalGamesWanted.com.
User friendly to take the stress out of scheduling.
Notes: For these honors, we also consider CIF Central Section players for Northern California. To nominate anyone, email markjtennis@gmail.com.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Girls State Basketball Player of the Week
Emerson Martin (Camarillo) Soph.
When you think of the Ventura County community of Camarillo and basketball, the first thoughts are of the great recent brother-sister combo of Jaime and Gabriela Jaquez. Jaime now plays for the Miami Heat and just two weeks ago he had his jersey retired at the Camarillo gym. Gabriela now plays for the No. 1 ranked UCLA Bruins.
There’s a sophomore on the Camarillo girls team who has a long way to go get to Jaquez territory, but has been on a roll in recent weeks and is a 6-foot sophomore to watch for numerous honors at the end of this season.
Martin, who is averaging 20.5 ppg this season for a team that is approaching 20 wins on the season, had two stellar outings last weekend in back-to-back games.
In a 81-50 win last Friday vs Moorpark, Emerson racked up a double-double of 31 points and 11 rebounds. The next night when the Scorpions topped St. Bonaventure of Ventura, she double-doubled again with 32 points and 10 rebounds.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Boys State Basketball Player of the Week
Mason Hodges
(San Juan Hills, SJ Capistrano) Sr.
We head to the far southern part of Orange County to find this week’s choice for SoCal boys and find a 6-foot-7 senior with a 4.6 GPA who is knocking down 24.7 points per game to go along with 12.0 rebounds and 3.7 assists.
Hodges really made his mark for the 18-7 Stallions in a 77-66 victory over San Clemente. This was a team that had defeated San Juan Hills 61-54 and 67-44 in two league games last season, but in this game Mason connected on 6-of-8 shots from beyond the three-point line and racked up 38 points.
“I have been preparing to come back and get this team for almost the whole year, so I was hungry,” Mason told local writer Ryan Kuhn from SoCoPrepSports.com.
Hodges also had 24 points later in the week in a 100-67 rout of Fountain Valley Los Amigos. In Mason’s previous game prior to last week, he matched the same output of out-classed Tesoro of Las Flores with 25 points in a 67-25 triumph. He’s had some of his top outings as well in matchups against higher-ranked competition, including 31 points in a loss to Pacifica Christian of Newport Beach and 28 points in a loss to Damien of La Verne.
San Juan Hills and Hodges will look to stay on a roll in a Wednesday game this week vs. Trabuco Hills of Mission Viejo.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Boys State Basketball Player of the Week
Connor Sheridan (Portola) Jr.
We’re really going off the beaten path to find this week’s NorCal boys’ honoree. The town of Portola is in Plumas County with a population of just over 2,000 and is a lot closer to Reno, Nevada, than any other California city. It’s also home to one of the largest railroad museums in the nation and is surrounded by tall trees on the eastern slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountains.
The Portola High Tigers have a tall tree of their own with the 6-foot-9 Sheridan and as one might expect a player like that playing other small town competition puts up off-the-charts totals. A good example is one game from last week that Connor had in a 67-59 win against Biggs. He had a double-double of 24 points and 24 rebounds plus eight blocks and six steals. In his other game last week, Sheridan pocketed 19 rebounds plus 22 points and seven blocks in a win vs Hamilton.
There were other weeks in which Connor could have been chosen for this honor, but the best one of 49 points and 25 rebounds came in the very first game vs Plumas Charter in a 91-73 win and at that time we were in our last week of selecting football players of the week. He also had 40 points in a January victory vs Oroville High.
For the season, Sheridan is averaging 25.3 points, 15.8 rebounds and 5.3 blocks per game. It takes 1,371 career rebounds to make the Cal-Hi Sports all-time state list and Connor is well on his way to reaching that. He had 1,147 entering his first game this week on Tuesday vs Maxwell. He also has 287 career blocks, but that all-time state list isn’t as deep and currently sits at 622 to qualify for it.
One never knows about how good a player from a place like Portola can be, but Connor has also been playing for the famed Oakland Soldiers AAU club team. That has put him in front of college coaches and analysts like our own Ronnie Flores. In Ronnie’s just updated Class of 2026 Hot 100 Player Rankings, Sheridan checked in at No. 69 just behind Ty Ingram of Los Angeles Westchester.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Girls State Basketball Player of the Week
Carly Amborn
(San Domenico, San Anselmo) Sr.
For our final stop this week, we go to one of the most beautiful parts of Marin County over the hills from Lucas Valley to a small school that has had boys and girls hoop success at the D5 level. It’s where this year’s Panthers’ girls team is being led by a 6-foot-1 point guard committed and signed as the first recruiting class at Stanford under new head coach Kate Paye, a former D5 state player of the year herself.
Amborn, who previously played at Archie Williams of San Anselmo, went a little bonkers for the Panthers in a 56-54 win last week vs Lick-Wilmerding of San Francisco. She piled up 42 points. Her exact game-by-game stats are not posted on MaxPreps, but some of her other outings were easy to find. In a game the previous week vs Urban of San Francisco, Carly connected for 31 points. Earlier this season in December, Amborn was the Marin Independent-Journal Prep of the Week when she had 40 points in a win vs Granada of Livermore at the Sonoma Valley tourney. She suffered a sprained ankle in the second game of that tournament and also didn’t play in a loss to Montgomery of Santa Rosa in the tourney championship.
Last season at San Domenico, Amborn led the team to its first CIF North Coast Section D5 title with 27 points and 15 rebounds in the final game vs Cornerstone Christian of Antioch. Then last May, she was one of just five players from California who was invited to the USA Basketball Women’s U17 National Team tryouts.
Mark Tennis is the co-founder and publisher of CalHiSports.com. He can be reached at markjtennis@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow Mark on the Cal-Hi Sports Twitter handle: @CalHiSports