Two of this week’s honorees are both juniors — Bryce Bedgood of Valencia and Kenyah Stubbs of Hanford. Photos: Dan Watson / The Signal & Twitter.com.
There was a window of time that opened up on Monday for us to get done with this week’s honorees and it has been done. This also is to ensure that each winner can enjoy perhaps 24 hours as player of the week before locking in on a Tuesday section playoff game. Our stops this week are in Tollhouse and Hanford for Northern California plus Valencia and Irvine for Southern California.
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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
Kenyah Stubbs (Hanford) Jr.
We head to Kings County also in the CIF Central Section for our stop to check out this week’s NorCal girls honoree. Hanford has been a big enough city to have two high schools for many years, but for Kenyah she plays at Hanford High (not Hanford West) and is becoming part of the Bullpups’ very impressive, historically great girls basketball program.
After making a huge leap last year as a sophomore starter to 21 points per game, Stubbs has continued to improve. Her stats from a win last Thursday against Lemoore were not reported, but earlier in the week she racked up 27 points plus six rebounds and four steals in a 53-45 victory over Mission Oak of Tulare. In two games from the week before that (both wins), Stubbs didn’t stub her toes, either. She had 36 and 27 points.
Stubbs’ season highs are 43 points vs Bullard of Fresno and 40 points vs Lemoore.
With the totals that have been reported, Kenyah is averaging 28.4 ppg entering a CIF Central Section D3 playoff game on Tuesday night against West of Bakersfield. The Bullpups are the No. 3 seed.
It was just a matter of time and which week in which Logan Kilbert from Sierra of Tollhouse captured NorCal Player of Week honors. Photo: ABC 30 Fresno.
Cal-Hi Sports Northern California
Boys Basketball Player of the Week
Logan Kilbert (Sierra, Tollhouse) Jr.
It was once figured out by our founder, the late Nelson Tennis, that Sierra High should be considered geographically the centralmost school in the state. It’s still NorCal for us and the Chieftains have a player right now who is front and center one of the most intriguing juniors in the state.
This is a good week to write up Logan as a NorCal player of the week as well.
In his games last week, Kilbert continues to lead the CIF Central Section in scoring as he finished the regular season with a 29.8 average. Logan started the week by scoring 34 points in a 91-67 win over Chowchilla and finished the week by scoring 37 points as Sierra defeated Fresno Christian.
Two weeks ago, Logan was making even louder noises. He began that week by scoring 41 points and grabbing 10 rebounds in a 83-55 win over Chowchilla. The following evening he became the 25th player in CIF Central Section history (according to section historian Bob Barnett) to reach 2,000 career points as he scored 54 points in three quarters
of play in a 113-32 romp past Parlier. The 54 points was a school record that also tied him with two other players in section history for 2nd best all time. In addition, he had 42 points in the first half alone, which makes the state record book.
We generally don’t like to pick players of the week after totals in a score like that, but with Kilbert we knew a better week would come up and we didn’t have to wait that long. He isn’t just a good player running up stats against small school competition, either. Our boys hoops analyst, Ronnie Flores, has consistently ranked the 6-foot-3 guard among the top 100 players for the Hot 100 and he was No. 47 in the most recent breakdown (up six spots).
On top of all that, Logan is a player who’s easy to root for. He lost his mother, Shawna, when he was just three years old and she was just 34 from cervical cancer. That’s why he wears the number 34. Logan’s story and his love of basketball also once caught the attention of the Regis and Kelly morning TV show, who filmed a segment with him and built a basketball court in the family backyard.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Boys Basketball Player of the Week
Bryce Bedgood (Valencia) Jr.
In starting out looking up all of the info on Bryce we could find, it’s actually not the performance he is getting credited for that nabbed him this week’s SoCal Player of the Week honor that has been the most impressive.
Bedgood is a rapidly emerging 6-foot-7 standout for the Vikings who also happens to be the son of head coach Bill Bedgood. In last Friday’s 63-48 triumph against Warren of Downey in the second round of the CIF Southern Section D4AA playoffs, Bryce posted his first-ever triple-double with 28 points, 20 rebounds and 10 blocks.
Any triple-doubles in a playoff game are special, but it was perhaps more impressive when Bedgood had 18 points, 18 rebounds and four blocks the last time that Valencia took a crack at state No. 3 West Ranch of Valencia in a Foothill League game. That’s a team with a 7-foot center and other high end talent. And Valencia only lost to West Ranch that night, 72-64.
Bedgood also had 18 points and 11 rebounds in a CIFSS D4AA playoff opener vs. Don Lugo of Chino. Two other recent Foothill League outings also have been noteworthy: 21 points and nine rebounds vs Golden Valley and 25 points, seven blocks and four assists vs Castaic.
We’re sure Bryce would like us also to give a shout out to senior teammate Mikah Ballew, who is actually Valencia’s leading scorer and who recently scored the 1,500th point of his career. Ballew, Bedgood and the rest of the Vikings play next on Tuesday in the CIFSS D4AA playoffs at Gabrielino of San Gabriel.
Moka Saiki from Portola of Irvine holds championship trophy after a tournament that the Bulldogs won earlier this season. Photo: Portola athletics.
Cal-Hi Sports Southern California
Girls Basketball Player of the Week
Moka Saiki (Portola, Irvine) Sr.
Portola High is situated on a beautiful new campus that is almost touching the nearby community of Lake Forest in Orange County. And that’s where we find this week’s SoCal girls honoree, who doesn’t see a lot of her shots touch the rim when she is hitting them from long distance.
Saiki was especially hot with her 3-point shooting last week in a CIF Southern Section D2A playoff opener. She made a school record nine 3-pointers and also set a school record with 41 points. It’s not an old school by any stretch, but trust us that those would be school records at a lot of other, much older schools. Moka didn’t cool off much either in Saturday’s second-round game against St. Mary’s Academy of Inglewood. She had 29 points as the Bulldogs advanced with a 60-54 triumph.
Earlier this season, Saiki also reached 1,000 career points. She and her teammates play next on Wednesday in what should be a great game vs Mark Keppel of Alhambra.
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:
