Without Lucas Shotts, the Crystal boys’ soccer team is a Central Coast Section finalist as the Gryphons made the 2025 Division V championship game, falling to Milpitas in the final.

The Burlingame Panthers got a surprise Nor Cal home game, and boy did they make the most of it.

WEDNESDAY

The Woodside softball team surprised everyone last year by capturing the school’s first-ever Central Coast Section championship, defeating Palma 4-3 for the Division IV title.

When it comes to post-game interviews, most of the time I stick with talking to coaches. A lot of times, it’s simply a timing issue. When a game is over, my job is only half done. While everyone else gets to go home or grab a bite to eat, I’m hustling back to the office to write my story and…

Daily Journal staff report

TUESDAY

Menlo-Atherton’s Nor Cal playoff opener culminated in one wild finish. Unfortunately for the Bears, the bedlam over the final eight minutes of regulation marked a finish for their season as well.

Maybe a little divinity is precisely what Menlo School needed.

When Hillsdale’s Christian Salamanca broke in on goal a minute into the second half, only to see his shot saved, it was a continuation of a first half that saw the Knights have a number of quality chances against Berkeley.

With Luisa Tava’s performance in last week’s Central Coast Section playoff opener, the Menlo-Atherton senior put herself into the conversation with the greats.

Eva Bhattacharya, Menlo-Atherton girls’ wrestling. No San Mateo County wrestler climbed higher on the state podium this season than Bhattacharya. The week prior, the M-A junior lightweight took second place in the 100-pound bracket at the Central Coast Section Masters championship finals. Bh…

Central Coast Section basketball and soccer championships have been decided and, for most schools and athletes, that means on to the spring sports season.

College of San Mateo is coming off quite a week on the softball diamond.

Skyline College rolled to its fifth straight win last Friday 11-6 over Cabrillo College at Trojan Diamond. And, in a rare consensus, the other two San Mateo County community college teams followed suit, as College of San Mateo rallied for a 7-6 home win over Hartnell College, and Cañada Coll…

TUESDAY

SANTA CLARA — “Storybook stuff.”

SALINAS — The Crystal boys’ soccer team had excuses built in to its second straight appearance in the Central Coast Section Division V championship game.

SANTA CLARA — Menlo-Atherton was a team on a mission.

SANTA CLARA — Sacred Heart Prep and Half Moon Bay have endured a rivalry since long before high school.

Menlo-Atherton junior Eva Bhattacharya is the queen San Mateo County wrestlers.

SANTA CLARA — For Notre Dame-Belmont, starring down Scotts Valley freshman Isabelle Jas was like looking in a mirror.

SAN JOSE — They call the 11th and 12th rounds of a boxing match “the championship rounds,” because those are where fights can be won and lost.

The Wildcatz captured their first-ever Central Coast Section girls’ soccer title, while denying the Mavericks their first with a 3-2 overtime win Saturday morning in the Division V finals at Sequoia High School.

SANTA CLARA — Valley Christian finished in fifth place in the six-team West Catholic Athletic League this season.

In back-to-back seasons, the Menlo girls' soccer team captured Central Coast Section championships, this time a 1-0 victory over Crystal for the Division IV title Saturday at Sequoia High.

If you didn’t look to the sidelines to see who was yelling out instructions, you would swear that there had been no coaching change for the Aragon girls’ basketball team.

The Carlmont boys’ soccer team has believed all season long that it can play with anybody in the Central Coast Section.

Terra Nova’s recently renovated, newly turfed fields are already paying for themselves in the win column.

Diamond Altamirano totaled 16 points and 8 rebounds to help lead No. 23-seeded College of the San Mateo women to a 71-62 upset win at No. 10 Lemoore in an opening-round game of the Northern California Regional Playoffs Wednesday night.

THURSDAY

THURSDAY

Half Moon Bay had one of the school’s double-double machines, girls’ standout Zoey Lemoge, on the drums in the pep band for Thursday’s Central Coast Section Division IV boys’ basketball semifinal.

Aragon’s Jayda Parangan had a look of ecstatic determination as she had the ball along the baseline, the defender on her back and clock winding down in a tie game with rival Hillsdale.

The Serra Padres might have set a program record outright had it not been for one sticky wicket on the depth chart.

The El Camino boys’ soccer team have been on a tear the last two seasons. The Colts won the 2025 Lake Division title and lost in the first round of the Central Coast Section Division V playoffs.

WEDNESDAY

When baseball hall of famer Reggie Jackson was at the height of his powers with the New York Yankees in the mid- to late-1970s, he earned the moniker, “Mr. October” for his penchant for performing at his best in the playoffs.

The final whistle sounded on Woodside’s season with the Wildcats right in front of Sacred Heart Cathedral’s goal. It’s where the No. 1 seeded team in Central Coast Section Division II girls’ soccer spent most of the evening — but to no avail.

After Tuesday night’s quarterfinals, there are still 14 San Mateo County boys’ and girls’ basketball team vying for Central Coast Section division championships as they play in semifinal games Thursday night.

No matter how bright the playoff spotlight, Menlo-Atherton senior Luisa Tava couldn’t miss.

Terra Nova was all ready to play its first on-campus baseball game in two years.

Boys’ basketball

TUESDAY

TUESDAY

TUESDAY

Burlingame’s road-warrior scoring exploits continued right into the Central Coast Section quarterfinals.

Carlmont boys’ basketball head coach Suhail Mohammadi was not worried about a nearly two-week layoff between games.

Notre Dame-Belmont’s celebration at the final buzzer was a spirited one Tuesday night, one a little more animated than you might expect from a 67-33 girls’ basketball blowout win in a playoff opener.

There’s a little slice of Heaven that once stood in Rome. Maybe it still does. Despite my best efforts to pinpoint it via modern internet search, however, it is nowhere to be found.