LAKEPORT — The Clear Lake Cardinals will be a well-rested group when they open play next week in the NorCal Region boys basketball playoffs, which is part of the CIF State Championship tournament.
Teams in Divisions I-VI will be seeded on Sunday and the brackets released later that evening.
Clear Lake (26-3) had its 17-game winning streak snapped Wednesday in a 79-62 loss to University High School of San Francisco in the semifinal round of the North Coast Section playoffs, the Cardinals’ first loss since late December. Depending on where the Cardinals are seeded, they could host one or more NorCal games. All first-round NorCal games are Tuesday except in Division VI, which begins on Wednesday.
The NorCal and SoCal regional winners in each division play for the state championship the weekend of March 8-9.
Clear Lake won the North Central League I championship this season with a 14-0 record. The Cardinals went on to beat St. Helena and Sonoma Academy in the first two rounds of the section playoffs before falling on the road against University.
Teams can switch divisions in the NorCal playoffs, so there is no guarantee that Clear Lake, University and Stuart Hall, the No. 1 seed in North Coast Section Division V, end up in the same NorCal division.
Clear Lake hosted a NorCal first-round game in 1989 and lost to Quincy, ending the Cardinals’ season at 25-4. That team won league and section titles before moving on to the NorCals.
