This just in, Liberty’s David Klingsheim, who was scheduled to drop from 119 pounds to 112 for the Mission Tournament, has just bumped back up to 119.

Also, there was no reasoning for Jesse Delgado’s disapperance from the tourney at 112 pounds. He’s ranked No. 1 in the state. I don’t know if Delgado knew Klingsheim’s plans to go back to 119, but you can only wonder if Delgado is dodging Klingsheim and or San Leandro’s Markjay Acosta, who now becomes the No. 1 seed at 112.

 Speaking of The Mission, here’s a quick video for everyone to check out http://bayareanewsgroup.com/multimedia/iba/2008/player/?f=0131_hoose

Kyle and I will be there on Saturday, providing live updates (pending a wireless signal). We’ll also be including picks and hopefully some video. Check with us on Friday night for updates, I’ll be providing them ASAP.

We have learned and are writing a story to run tomorrow in the paper, that long time Foothill coach Matt Sweeney will return to guide the Falcons. John Mannion, who did a wonderful job in his one year coaching the team, made the decision to step down so as to make room for Sweeney to return.

Mannion will remain on the staff and as Sweeney said, “He will be a co-head coach as far as I am concerned.”

Congrats to Mannion for guiding the Falcons to the playoffs in his first year running the show,  and welcome back to Sweeney. 

 More later…

Alright, I’ve been waiting for this time of the year _ top-notch wrestling. The Mission is coming up this weekend and the seeds just came out.

Here is the link to get to all the info on The Mission tourney: http://www.msjwrestlingtournament.com/

Kristian Blanco and Nguyen Truong wrestle at 105 on Wednesday. Blanco pinned Truong in 5:03.

Today should be a big day in the Oakland Athletic League boys basketball race with two good matchups. McClymonds, the No. 1 team in our poll, travels to Fremont. The Tigers have had an up and down year but are a lot better than I think some our giving them credit for. Mack, for one, knows how dangerous this game could be. The last time the Warriors lost a game (outside of the state title game) was in the regular season finale last year on the road at Fremont. Also, with two league losses, the Tigers know they can’t continue to fall further in the hole if they still want a chance to earn one of the three OAL playoff spots.The other big game is No. 13 Skyline at No. 7 Oakland. For most of the preseason, Oakland looked like the second best team in the OAL to Mack. Now, Skyline’s starting to grab that role, having won 8 straight, including three straight against ranked opponents. A win here for the Titans sets up a possible first-place showdown Friday at Mack (if Mack gets past Fremont). An Oakland win ties them for second with Skyline and gives them another quality OAL victory. Should be fun stuff.

Also, on the girls side, Oakland Tech faces Castlemont. The Knights have looked like easily the best team in the OAL and Tech continues to struggle. Still, Tech is the defending champions and has a pretty good rivalry going with Castlemont. Expect an intense game there.

***UPDATE***
Guess I might as well update this post with what happened. Mack stayed undefeated with a wild 78-61 win. The Warriors actually trailed by 8 early in the third quarter, used a 14-0 run to take a six-point lead, then had to get a pair of clutch free throws by Frank Otis in the final minute and use pressure defense to not allow Fremont to get off a final shot so the game could go to overtime. Whoooosh!! I’m out of breath. Once in OT, Mack dominated as you can tell by the score. One scary moment was when Otis was fouled hard and went down and stayed down for 3-4 minutes. He eventually walked off and afterwards just said he had the wind knocked out of him. Otis finished with 21, Damario Simms had 18, William Cherry had 16 and Damon Powell had 15, including four dunks. Powell Lee had 18 for Fremont and James Albright had 14 points and 15 rebounds.

As for Skyline-Oakland, the Wildcats got the big home victory, 62-57. Damian Lillard had a game-high 22 points and P.J. Taylor had 13 for Oakland. Kwame Vaughn led Skyline with 17 points and Nefi Perdomo added 13, but the Titans couldn’t extend their winning streak to nine.

On the girls side, no big surprise as Castlemont rolled past Tech. They’re looking like the clear league favorite right now, but don’t sleep on Mack. The Warriors won again today, beating Fremont to go to 3-1 in league. A good game should be Friday when they play Skyline, which is also 3-1 after surviving a scare from Oakland to win 39-33.

These rankings were done by Staff Writer Dennis Miller for games through Jan. 27

1. Amador Valley (13-3-2)

2. Pittsburg (14-1-4)

3. Richmond (14-3-3)

4. De La Salle (10-1-8)

5. Deer Valley (13-4-2)

6. California (9-4-3)

7. Hayward (13-2-2)

8. San Ramon Valley (8-4-6)

9. Miramonte (15-2-2)

10. Washington (11-4-3)

Others receiving consideration: Granada, Newark Memorial, Monte Vista, Piedmont, San Leandro, College Park and James Logan.

These rankings were done by Staff Writer Dennis Miller for games through Jan. 27

1. Castro Valley (17-1-1)

2. Monte Vista (16-2-3)

3. Carondelet (14-1-4)

4. Clayton Valley (14-2-4)

5. Foothill (14-3-2)

6. San Ramon Valley (11-4-5)

7. California (11-4-2)

8. Miramonte (14-1-2)

9. Bishop O’Dowd (12-4-0)

10. Campolindo (12-3-3)

Others receiving consideration: Northgate, Amador Valley, Piedmont, College Park and Liberty.

Boys Basketball East Bay Super Poll
Team                            Record             Pts       Last week        Comment

1. McClymonds (14)    20-0                 210          1                   Warriors are idle, rumor is they moved up in this poll during off week

2. De La Salle              16-2                 193          2                   Spartans got a couple of those No. 2 votes back, still not all of them

3. St. Mary’s                22-1                 185          3                  In many other years, Panthers would occupy top spot, just not this year

4. San Leandro 14-3                 167          5                  Win over previous No. 4 Castro Valley earn shares of first in HAAL and the No. 4 spot in poll

5. Castro Valley           18-2                 150          4                  Admirable effort on the road against SL without star, but those in the know, know CV should have two losses to Pirates

6. Monte Vista             16-4                 139          6                  I personally have these guys ranked No. 12, still not sure about the strength of the EBAL in hoops

7. Oakland                   15-6                 117          8                  Move up a spot while idle as OAL takes week off for finals, play No. 13 Skyline on Wednesday

8. Kennedy-Rich.         18-3                 105          7                  Again take lead into fourth against St. Mary’s only to lose to No. 3 Panthers

9. Berkeley                   11-7                 86            11                I predicted about three weeks ago that they’d eventually be a top-10 team, I guess I know what I’m talking about

10. Newark Memorial  17-5                 82            10                Bounce back from loss to Skyline at MLK to win twice in MVAL

11. Salesian                  17-4                 79             9                 Knew it’d be hard for young team to keep rolling, but 86-58 to St. Mary’s was a bit rough

12. Miramonte              17-2                 56            12               All they do is keep winning, have won 8 straight now

13. Skyline                   13-7                 48            13               Tough week as they return to OAL play, host Oakland on Wednesday, travel to face Mack on Friday

14. Foothill                   15-5                 26            14               I still haven’t thrown the Falcons a vote this year and 19-point loss to Monte Vista makes me question why they’re still ranked

15. James Logan          18-5                 14             15              Not a whole lot of great wins (except Skyline when the Titans were down) but they continue to rack up the W’s

Others receiving votes: Pittsburg (15-4) 12, Campolindo (12-6) 7, El Cerrito (12-5) 3, Fremont-Oakland (13-7) 1.

Team                                        Record             Pts        Last week       Comment

1. Berkeley (11)                       15-2                 205              2               Roll past ACCAL teams, take advantage of Deer Valley loss

2. Carondelet (2)                      16-3                 195               1               Hang loss on No. 1, deservingly earn some votes for top spot

3. Deer Valley  (1)                    16-3                 185               1               Don’t know how they still managed a No. 1 vote after losing to Carondalet

4. Moreau Catholic                   16-4                 150               4               Beat No. 5 BOD to move into tie for first, would’ve moved up higher for me had they not lost to Hercules

5. Miramonte                            16-3                 147              6               Among the few teams at the top that didn’t lose

6. Bishop O’Dowd                   17-3                 133              3              Loss to Moreau isn’t so bad, can’t expect to sweep Mariners

7. St. Mary’s                            19-3                 129              7              Showdown with St. Pat’s looms on Friday

8. Washington                          18-2                 117              8             Would’ve moved up more, but lost Saturday to D-V power Pinewood, which is only 11-7 this year

9. Castlemont                           15-4                 102              10           Knights were idle last week, own first place in the OAL

10. Northgate                           18-1                 85                11            Starting to put together some resume-building victories

11. Hercules                             12-4                 72                13            Freshman Brittany Boyd concludes monster week with 30 points in upset of Moreau

12. Monte Vista                       18-2                 58                12            There’s differing opinion on the Mustangs, but I’m a fan

13. Piedmont                            15-5                 48                 9             Were tied with St. Pat’s at halftime before Cowling took over and lead Bruins to lopsided win

14. American                            18-5                 24                 15            Carbonal and Eagles gain momentum each week

15. Dublin                                14-4                 12                 14            Gaels miss chance to knock off Northgate

Others receiving votes: Arroyo (15-4) 9, Albany (14-6) 8, Amador Valley (13-7) 1.

Wanted to hear some thoughts on the subject. I know American’s Alex Carbonel is a phenom. In Friday’s 73-29 win over Irvington she dropped 29 points. She’s going to St. Mary’s next year. I’ve covered her for four years and might be the best point guard to come through the Mission Valley Athletic League (at least in the eight years I’ve been working at The Argus). The best to come from American???

This Hayward Area Athletic League showdown certainly lived up to its billing and more.

Jared Cunningham had a double-double to lead the Pirates to a 58-54 victory, but Castro Valley had outstanding efforts from DJ Broome, Rashad Parker and Dan Teicher. The three really battled their tails off and showed CV is going to be a team to reckon with in the playoffs.

Of course, Castro Valley played without its leading scorer Jourdan DeMuynck, who was serving a one-game suspension for getting two technicals in Wednesday’s win over Hayward.

My goodness, Broome just was flying by the San Leandro defense. That kid has some serious handles and his ability to get to the rim is pretty unbelievable. He is so quick.  And Parker hitting all those 3-pointers, including the clutch one to bring Castro Valley within one with under 30 seconds to go was impressive.

But Cunningham, who has verbally agreed as a junior to attend Arizona State, topped all the performances. He finished, I believe, with 27 points and 12 rebounds.

I was really impressed with both squads. They should both go far in the playoffs. And they better not be playing each other in the first round of NCS! The HAAL needs a chance to represent. These two squads can really go a long ways.

The crowd was great. Both San Leandro and Castro Valley fans were great. It was a great high school basketball game. The way it should be (besides the fight that nearly broke out at the end of the game).

It will be interesting to see if either team slips up and allows the other to gain the outright league title. This is the HAAL and anything can happen (and usually does).

I will just be flip-flopping these two teams in the poll (CV came in No. 4 and SL No. 5). But some voters get out of hand when a team loses, so who knows where CV will end up. Doesn’t really matter, they will end up near the top once the playoffs roll around.