Catching up with playoffs

Let’s start with gymnastics. Yes, CCS offers a gymnastics championship meet, dating back to 1976.

And one of the top programs in the section resides on the San Mateo County coast as Half Moon Bay is one of the few teams in the Peninsula Athletic League to field a team.

In 2016, Half Moon Bay’s Katie Nelson won the individual all-around title, winning all four disciplines: bars, floor, vault and beam. Six years later, the Cougars’ squad of Josie Kearns, Jaya Miller, Mikaela Sendino, Camryn Tobias and Paige Zanette gave the school its first CCS gymnastics team title at Gymtowne in South San Francisco May 18.

The quintet of Cougars posted the best combined score in the vault, bars and floor, while finishing second in the beam.

In the individual all-around competition, Kearns finished second to Rettie Chow of Mountain View. Additionally, Jaya Miller, who won the uneven bars individual title, finished in a tie for third, Tobias was fifth and Paige Zanette was eighth.

Tying for third in the all-around was Mercy-Burlingame’s Olivia Langridge, who was the only gymnast to win two of the individual apparatus titles: floor and vault.

She was the lone representative for the Crusaders.

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The Menlo School tennis team sure has a good argument about being a mythical national champion.

After winning their 25th straight league title, the top-seeded Knights added a 17th CCS championship, barely getting past second-seeded Cupertino, 4-3.

By making the CCS finals, both Menlo and Cupertino got bids to the Northern California regional tournament, at which the Knights made their statement of the best in the country. After shutting out Pleasant Valley-Chico 7-0 in the semifinals, the Knights got a rematch with Cupertino in the championship match.

This time, Menlo left no doubt as the Knights buried the Pioneers, 7-0.

A 26-1 record, another league title, a runner-up finish at the National Invitational Tournament, a CCS and Nor Cal tournament title, along with the fact that this might be the deepest team in Menlo’s long history of success? The Knights make quite the argument.

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The Sacred Heart Prep boys’ and girls’ lacrosse teams were both seeded second in the CCS tournaments and they both advanced to the championship matches against top-seeded St. Ignatius.

And it was the Wildcats who reasserted their dominance as the best in Northern California as they swept the Gators last Saturday at Menlo-Atherton High School.

In the boys’ title game, St. Ignatius beat SHP 19-13. On the girls’ side, the Wildcats hung on for an 11-10 victory.

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Years ago, I would often take the CCS to task for various perceived issues. Over the year, however, I’ve mellowed my stance and taken a less confrontational approach when it comes to discussing CCS and the way it runs the section.

Mostly, I came to the conclusion that the section is not going to make everyone happy.

But, I can’t help but bring up the fact that the neutral sites for semifinal events is simply not necessary. I have no problems with CCS finals and championship games being held at places like Excite Ballpark (previously San Jose Municipal Stadium) for the CCS title game or hosting a championship football game at San Jose City College or Santa Clara University for basketball finals or any of the other various venues the CCS uses for championship games. Special games should be in special venues.

But any neutral-site game before the finals is just overkill — unless there are games matching teams from the extreme ends of the section. But even then, it’s not unheard of for a Peninsula Athletic League tennis team having to travel to Monterey for a CCS tennis match.

It becomes especially silly when the Hillsdale and Capuchino softball teams and their fans had to travel to San Jose PAL Stadium Wednesday, when any neutral site on the Peninsula is a better option than battling Bay Area traffic to get to San Jose, which took nearly an hour Tuesday afternoon to go what my map app says was 29 miles.

Nathan Mollat can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com or by phone: 344-5200 ext. 117. To report scores or tips, email sports@smdailyjournal.com.