LAKE COUNTY >> If you like players who give 100 percent on both ends of the floor, then you’ll love Valerie Hutton. A three-year varsity veteran, the senior guard excelled on offense and defense for the Clear Lake Cardinals during the 2017-18 season. She is the most valuable player on the All-Lake County girls basketball team.
Selected by the Lake County Record-Bee with input from area coaches, the All-County team has a distinctly Clear Lake flavor to it after the Cardinals’ 24-6 campaign, one that included a share of the North Central League I championship, a semifinal berth in the North Coast Section playoffs, and a trip to the quarterfinals in the Northern California Division V playoffs.
No Clear Lake team has made it that far since the 1988-89 squad qualified for the NorCal championship game, losing to Menlo at the old Arco Arena in Sacramento.
Along with being one of the Cardinals’ top scorers this season, Hutton was the team’s No. 1 defender, often drawing the opposition’s best player and more times than not shutting that person down. Clear Lake coach Kory Reynolds said Hutton’s offensive output often suffered because of the amount of energy she expended on defense, but that it was essential to the team’s success this season.
The team leader on a senior-dominated roster, Hutton’s individual success along with that of her talented teammates translated into a great deal of team success. The Cardinals went from 15 wins in Hutton’s sophomore season to 20 her junior year and 24 this season. They qualified for the sectional playoffs all three years and for the NorCals the last two.
The All-County first team had all kinds of scoring punch led by the Lower Lake senior guard tandem of Aleia Milano and Vanessa Hughes. Milano averaged a county-best 23 points a game while Hughes averaged a double-double of 15.6 points and 13.0 rebounds per game. Milano, a four-year varsity starter, finishes her career with 1,761 points, a Lower Lake record and third on the county’s list of all-time leaders.
Joining Milano and Hughes on the first team is Kelseyville junior guard Payton Conrad, a three-year varsity starter who topped 1,000 career points during the season. She’ll become the school’s all-time girls scoring leader early next season and should easily top 1,500 career points.
Other first-team players are Clear Lake senior Camille Donald and Clear Lake junior Kortnie Reynolds, both guards and key components of the Cardinals’ deep postseason run this season.
Second team
Named to the All-County second team are Clear Lake senior posts Kiana Richardson and Corin Alakszay, Kelseyville post Grace Davidson, Upper Lake center Brenna Sanchez, and Middletown junior guard Kassi Agapoff.
With just a tad more luck the Cardinals might still be playing basketball this season, but 24-6 is nothing to sneeze at and Reynolds and his assistants certainly earned their keep. Their next task will be rebuilding the 2018-19 club that has only one returning starter.
