Two of this week’s honorees are Abbie Mullins from Cardinal Newman of Santa Rosa and Marcus Adams Jr. from Narbonne of Harbor City. Photos: Mark Tennis / Cal-Hi Sports & @Compton_Magic / Twitter.com.
It turns out that both of the girls featured for this week had performances that were seen in person by Cal-Hi Sports, although we cheated a bit for one of them since there was a Tuesday game from this week involved. In the end, the four honorees represent El Dorado County, Sonoma County in the north and Los Angeles County for both boys & girls winners in the south.
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Notes: For these honors, we consider CIF Central Section players for Northern California. To nominate anyone, email markjtennis@gmail.com.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Girls Basketball Player of the Week
Abbie Mullins (Cardinal Newman, Santa Rosa) Sr.
The Redwood Empire and the Rose City is where we head in search of the Northern California Girls Basketball Player of the Week, and it’s at Cardinal Newman where we find our sharpshooting award winner.
Abbie is not a big star but she’s a fou-your varsity player who plays hard on both ends of the court with one of 5-foot-5 guard’s specialties being the ability to hit from long range.
The Cardinals have several girls that can score and are in double-figure scoring per game, but last Saturday in Stockton at the St. Mary’s MLK Showcase the day belonged to Abbie.
Playing for the at the time Cal-Hi Sports No. 18 ranked Cardinals against No. 17 ranked Antelope, Abbie went bonkers after nailing a career-high nine three-pointers and knocking down a career-high 37 points in an impressive 81-46 Cardinal Newman victory.
“My teammates were doing a great job getting me open,” Mullins said following the game, which was seen by Cal-Hi Sports editor/founder Mark Tennis. “No, we didn’t expect a game like this against that team. We just played hard and executed great.”
Earlier last week, she hardly played in North Bay League – Oak Division blowout wins over Ukiah and Sebastopol Analy, and she wasn’t the top producer in the MLK Day Monday 54-45 win at the MLK Showcase over a very solid McClatchy of Sacramento, but the Saturday performance is not the first time Mullins has been summoned by head coach Monica Mertle to step it up this season.
“She’s a fantastic shooter,” Mertle said. “Every game she is capable of something like this.”
Early in the season, Mullins had 22 points and was named Player of the Game in an 81-65 victory over Bishop O’Dowd (Oakland) at the Pinole Valley Showcase that avenged a heartbreaking loss to O’Dowd in the CIF North Coast Section Open Division playoffs last season. And at the Paris Twins Classic at Piedmont, Abbie snagged an All-Tournament selection, and at the West Coast Jamboree Mullins had a game-high 24 points with five three-pointers in a Platinum Division 59-51 victory over previously state-ranked San Joaquin Memorial of Fresno.
It appears Abbie likes a big stage for her top performances.
So far this season for the 15-6 Cardinals and heading into a Thursday night game at cross-town Maria Carrillo, Mullins is averaging 11 points per game and has made 60 three-pointers.
Maybe we should have waited to write up Mason Mottashed of Union Mine since he might score the 1,000th point of his career this week. Photo: Twitter.com.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Boys Basketball Player of the Week
Mason Mottashed (Union Mine, El Dorado) Sr.
The Mother Lode area of California around 45 miles east of Sacramento and a little over four miles south of Placerville east of Highway 49 at Union Mine in historic El Dorado is where we find our Northern California Boys Basketball Player of the Week.
Last week, in a 74-57 victory over El Dorado of Placerville, Mottashed was shedding all defenders and ended up with a career high 44 points after shooting a blistering 9 of 15 on three-pointers and 11 of 12 on the free-throw line. Mason, a 6-foot-1 point guard, also earned a double-double after snaring 11 rebounds. He had another double-double last week after going for 15 points and 11 rebounds in a 70-56 victory over Bradshaw Christian of Sacramento.
According to Joe Davidson of the Sacramento Bee, the 44-point performance by Mottashed is the top single game point total so far this season in the Sacramento metro area.
So far this season for the 18-4 Diamondbacks and heading into a Friday night Sierra Valley Conference matchup on the road at Galt, Mottashed is averaging 20.4 points, 6.5 assists, 6.3 rebounds and 2.3 steals per game. Mason is shooting 49 percent on three-pointers and he’s 80 of 92 on the free-throw line, and that translates into an 87-percent mark a lot of pros might envy.
On a final note, this statewide award comes at a perfect time since Mottashed is only 51 points away from the 1,000 career points milestone.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Boys Basketball Player of the Week
Marcus Adams Jr. (Narbonne, Harbor City) Sr.
The South Bay portion of the metro Los Angeles area is where we head to honor our Southern California Boys Basketball Player of the Week, and it’s at Narbonne in Harbor City between Torrance and Long Beach that we find our award winner. Now, after being named the Daily Breeze Athlete of the Week, Adams snags a statewide honor.
Last week in two Marine League victories, Marcus made a big fuss after he put up some astronomical numbers.
He started the week with a gargantuan double-double after depositing a nifty 50 points including 10 three-pointers with 21 rebounds in an 84-68 win over San Pedro. Two days later, and in a 53-45 win over Gardena, the 6-foot-8 forward had another double-double after going for 33 points and 12 rebounds.
If Adams keeps putting up these kind of numbers, the 247sports.com 4-star rated prospect will almost assuredly increase his offers from the current 13 he already has that include several major D1 schools.
Adams is not new to the big-time scoring scene, either. Two years ago as a freshman, he made the weekly Stat Stars feature when he had 50 points in a win over Rancho Dominguez of Long Beach.
Skye Belker of Los Angeles Windward hit for 29 points when the Wildcats beat Corona Santiago at the Matt Denning Classic. Photo: Harold Abend.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Girls Basketball Player of the Week
Skye Belker (Windward, Los Angeles) Sr.
To find our Southern California Girls Basketball Player of the Week, we head to Los Angeles and just east of the Santa Monica Airport and a couple of blocks west of the I-5 freeway. We land at Windward but where we actually saw Skye in person was in Santa Ana.
Last Saturday, in an impressive 69-48 victory over Cal-Hi Sports No. 20 Santiago of Corona at the Matt Denning Hoops Classic at Mater Dei, Belker put the Wildcats on her back. The Princeton-committed combo guard finished with a double-double 29 points (four three-pointers) and 10 rebounds with three assists and four steals. She had 17 points in a first half that saw Windward turn a 21-17 deficit into a 33-23 halftime lead. Belker’s and the team’s final points of the half came on a heave from beyond the mid-court line that touched nothing but net.
Earlier in the week, Belker had 20 points, nine rebounds and five assists in an 81-57 win over North Hollywood Campbell Hall.
With a six-game winning streak and the win over Santiago, the Wildcats broke into the state rankings with the No. 18 spot. Gold Coast League arch rival and nearby Brentwood of Los Angeles was up on Tuesday night. Brentwood was a 72-61 winner over Windward earlier this season in a tournament. The Eagles also came into the rankings but because of the previous win they got the No. 17 spot. This week’s performance doesn’t really count for the award but as you may have guessed, in the Tuesday outing, Belker blasted Brentwood after going for 39 points and nine rebounds in a 73-62 road victory.
So far this season for the 14-5 Wildcats, Belker is averaging 23.2 points, 6.7 rebounds and 3.3 assists per game.
Harold Abend is the associate editor of CalHiSports.com and the vice president of the California Prep Sportswriters Association. He can be reached at marketingharoldabend@gmail.com. Don’t forget to follow him on Twitter: @HaroldAbend
