dana hills 00--01 preview

The "official' high school season in Southern California begins tomorrow, November 27, when teams can schedule their first regular games. And some of the more traditional (e.g., newspaper) media have been printing and publishing league and team profiles too, which is a very good thing, because it saves us a ton of time in researching our own previews and profiles. So with thanks to the OC Register (which did a short preview of the South Coast League boys' and girls teams today), here's our own SoCalHoops preview of the South Coast League teams. Rather than do this as one solid "league" profile though, we've broken the reviews down team by team, in to separate reports.

Dana Hills Dolphins
Division I-AA
Head Coach: Mark Thornton (5th year 42-61)
1999-2000: 6-20 overall, 0-10 league (6th Place)

danahillslogo.gif (13569 bytes)

1999-2000 South Coast League Final Standings
Team	League	Overall
El Toro	10-0	22-4
Capistrano Valley	7-3	17-9
San Clemente	5-5	14-10
Trabuco Hills	5-5	13-13
Mission Viejo	3-17	12-14
Dana Hills	0-10	6-20

There's not much to say about Dana Hills, except things should get better, because they can't get worse. The Dolphins didn't qualify for the playoffs last season, with only 6 wins, and they didn't win a game in league. While they may manage one or two wins this season (maybe more), they are still predicted by all of the coaches in the league to again finish last, according to the OC Register's league profile (published 11/26/00). Mark Thornton is in his 5th season and is hoping for better things this year from his squad.

Since the team didn't qualify for the playoffs, we don't have the full roster which is usually made available through the media sheets at time the the playoff seedings are announced, so we'll have to go with what we know from the Register's small preview, which isn't much. Here's what the partial roster looks like:

2000-2001 Dana Hills
Partial Roster

Shane Del Rosario

6'-2" Sr. C

Mitch Matthews

6'-3" Jr. F

Travis Nelson

6'-3" Sr. F

Mike Rush

5'-10" Jr. G

Lorca Ghanbari

5'-10" So. G

Sal Gonzales

6'-2" Sr. F

Returning players include Shane Del Rosario, who averaged 8 ppg and 4.2 rpg, Mitch Matthews who averaged 9 ppg, and Nelson and Rush, whose averages weren't listed anywhere we could locate. Newcomers to the team are Lorca Ghanbari and Sal Gonzales. As the OC Register noted, "The Dolphins don't have a star, but they have a team shoots and runs well." Guess we'll find out.

The Dolphins will play an entirely local schedule, and they'll start at the La Habra Tournament tomorrow, November 27-December 2. From there, they have a game with Laguna Hills, then Aliso Nigue, then more individual gamesw with Laguna Beach and Irvine, and they will also play in two other local tournaments, the Irvine World News Tournament and the Century Tournament. It's likely to be a long season again for Dana Hills, which is just trying to make the playoffs this season and put together a couple of good runs, because in high school basketball, sometimes momentum and good shooting and speed can overcome otherwise more talented opponents.

The Dana Hills school website, by the way does have the complete season schedule posted and it looks like they're also going to post results as well, so you can follow their progress that way if you'd like. Interestingly, and perhaps indicative of the view of the team, the website doesn't list the roster or the names of any players, but it does have some really neat pictures of the administrators and of coach Thornton (see photo above).