A No. 9 seed, a No. 10 seed and a No. 12 seed all advanced to the Open Division quarterfinals in CIF-SS basketball.
It's the section's version of February Madness. Quarterfinal matchups will be held on Wednesday. The Cinderella stories, if you will, of Cathedral, Chino Hills and Orange Lutheran will continue Wednesday.
No. 9 seed Cathedral should be a confident bunch when it faces Del Rey League rival and No. 1 seed Bishop Montgomery in a game that will be played at Monrovia High School.
It's hard to beat a team three times in one season. Cathedral was on the losing end of two league matchups with Bishop Montgomery earlier this season. Those two losses, however, were by a combined 13 points. The Phantoms are the only Del Rey League team to lose to Bishop Montgomery by single digits this season.
The Knights ran through the rest of league competition by an average of 25.3 points. Four of those wins were by 20 or more points.
Long Beach Poly head coach Shelton Diggs knew he was up against a very tough opponent in No. 10 seed Chino Hills. For the Jackrabbits, it was just no stopping the Ball brothers -- junior Lonzo, a UCLA commit and sophomore LiAngelo -- who combined for 54 points in the Chino Hills 78-54 win.
For its efforts, the Huskies will have a home game against 2-seed Mater Dei on Wednesday in a rematch of last season's Open Division final.
The No. 10 seed received by Chino Hills might just be a technicality based on the team's 13-12 record heading into the postseason. The Huskies were forced to forfeit 11 games -- nine of which were wins -- earlier this season which makes that record deceiving.
Orange Lutheran is no slouch. The second-place team in the Trinity League was able to get to the right side of the bracket as a No. 12 seed with a one-point win over No. 5 seed Damien in the first round.
The Lancers will play host to No. 4 seed Corona Centennial in quarterfinal action at Hope International University.
Corona Centennial's 95 points were the most of any team in the Open Division first round in its 26-point win over Mission League champs, Alemany.
A Corona Centennial, Bishop Montgomery semifinal might be one of the more anticipated games of the entire postseason but might not happen if Cinderella has something to say about it.
