La Costa Canyon, which began and ended the 2013-14 campaign as the No. 1 team in the San Diego Section weekly poll (it fell to fifth during the season)  is again at the top of the UT-San Diego inaugural basketball voting.

The Mavericks returned four starters (another reportedly tranferred to a prep school in New Hampshire) from last season’s 27-5 squad.

La Costa has a game against Las Flores Tesoro on Saturday after posting a 3-1 record in the Mission Viejo Diablo Inferno Tournament.

La Costa dropped a 62-47 decision to La Mirada and topped La Habra Sonora, 70-68, Anaheim Canyon, 69-54, and Anaheim Esperanza, 73-56.

Second-ranked Football Hills Christian, already 4-0 with a game against San Ysidro tonight, features 6-foot, 9-inch T.J. Leaf, who averaged 25.6 points and 12.6 rebounds as a sophomore.

A state Division IV favorite, Foothill will find out a lot about itself against Chino Hills Dec. 17 in the Tarkanian Vegas Classic and when the Knights meet Los Angeles Westchester in the first round of the post-Christmas Torrey Pines tournament.

St. Augustine, which lost to La Costa, 62-60, in the Open Division finals after topping the Mavericks, 77-74, in the regular season last year, is without Trey Kell for the first time in four seasons, but is 3-0, with wins over Box Hill of Australia, 65-46, 61-55 over Cathedral, and 84-52 over Rancho Bernardo.

Week 1 poll with last year’s records  and final ranking:

*Awarded on 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 basis. NR–Not ranked.

Others receiving votes:  Grossmont, 15; Mater Dei, 11; Cathedral, Poway, 10 each; Army-Navy, Steele Canyon, 7 each; Mission Baay, 54; Sweetwater, 3; Eastlake, 2.

Eleven San Diego County sportswriters and broadcasters, and a CIF San Diego Section representative vote each week. The panel includes John Maffei and Kirk Kenney (UT-San Diego), Terry Monahan (UT-San Diego correspondent), Bill Dickens (eastcountysports.com), Steve Brand (San Diego Hall of Champions), John Labeta (CIF San Diego Section), Bodie DeSilva (sandiegopreps.com), Aaron Burgin (fulltimeshoops.com), Rick Willis (KUSI Chl. 51), Rick Smith (partletonsports.com), Drew Willis (sdcoastalsports.com).

Noel Mickelsen, Charlie Paulk, and Richard Verlasky recently passed.

Mickelsen, 80, had a lengthy coaching career in San Diego’s East County after posting a 71-62 record in nine seasons of professional baseball, including three years in  the AAA Pacific Coast League.

The 6-foot, 6-inch Mickelsen was a star player on the 1955-56 San Diego State basketball team that posted a 23-6 record and gained the second round of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics tournament in Kansas City.

The Aztecs were beaten, 69-60, by Gustavus Adolphus of Minnesota.  Mickelsen still ranks No. 10 among the Aztecs’ all-time leading rebounders.

HORNETS WON STATE TITLE

Paulk, 68, became coach at Lincoln before the 1994-95 season and led the Hornets to a 25-7 record and the state IV championship, the first for San Diego Section team.

Led by future NBA player Mark Sanford, the Hornets closed fast and won four state tournament games,  105-51 over Easton Washington, 83-51 over Oxnard Santa Clara, 94-93 over Los Angeles Verbum Dei, and 63-50 over San Anselmo Sir Francis Drake.

A 6-8 forward from Northeastern State in Louisiana, Paulk played three seasons in the NBA. He was the Milwaukee Bucks’ first selection and the seventh pick in the first round of the 1968-69 draft.

SAINTS STANDOUT

Verlasky, 70, was a San Diego attorney who starred at St. Augustine and played for legendary coach Phil Woolpert at the University of San Diego and with future NBA coach Bernie Bickerstaff.

Verlasky averaged 12 points  and was one of the Eastern League’s leading scorers in the Saints’ 13-7 season in 1961-62.

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La Jolla Country Day’s 60-42 loss to Los Altos Hills Pinewood in the State Girls’ V championship last week was the final, tumbling domino in a disappointing San Diego Section season.

Mater Dei Catholic was the only boys’ team to advance beyond the first round of the Southern California Regional and got to the Division II semifinals before losing to eventual state champion Bellflower St. John Bosco, 84-64.

San Diego Section boys teams lost 11 of 12 first-round encounters.  The girls won 6 of 14.

Mount Miguel girls reached the D-III semifinals but were beaten, 60-50, by Santa Barbara, which got to the state finals before losing to Modesto Christian, 64-55.

FARED BETTER A YEAR AGO

Local teams won 8 of 11 first-round games in 2012-13 and earned two championships, St. Augustine boys in D-III and Horizon girls in D-V. Area squads had won championships in three of the previous four years.

St. Augustine was denied the opportunity to defend its  championship and forced to play in the new Open Division.  The Saints went out early, losing to Santa Ana Mater Dei, 65-38.

La Costa Canyon, another Open Division entry, went down, 71-51, to Redondo Beach Redondo Union.

Criteria for the Open Division is based on a premise of  “past success” and other factors in a confusing tableau.

Why, then, should La Jolla Country Day, a traditional girls state power, be allowed to drop after elimination in San Diego’s Open division to the state D-V bracket?

That champions St. Augustine and La Costa Canyon had to play on the road in first-round games was a radical departure from other years.

Adding to confusion, the divisional nomenclature in San Diego is not the same as for the rest of the state.  Example, Kearny won the San Diego Section D-IV title but played in the D-III regional bracket, losing to La Canada St. Francis, 67-62.

ROAD TO DESTRUCTION

To underscore the weakness of the San Diego Section against the rest of the state were blowouts by margins of 70-21, 85-51, 62-34, 69-33, 79-60, 83-38, and 88-39, among others.

Ocean View Christian was outscored, 67-4, by San Juan Capistrano JSerra.  Perhaps embarrassed, the editor of the state website refused to list the score in the bracket results.

Another head shaker was The Bishop’s 70-26 loss to Long Beach Poly in the Girls’ Open.

The Bishop’s, enrollment about 500?

Long Beach Poly, enrollment more than 4,000?

They were in the same division?

KELL, STEWARD LEAD SCORERS

St. Augustine’s Trey Kell and San Ysidro’s Lynard Stewart each scored 768 points to lead all scorers in the San Diego Section, according to unofficial records by Max Preps.

Kell averaged 24 points in 32 games and Steward averaged 26.5 in 29 games.  Foothills Christian’s T.J. Leaf scored 689 points and also had a 26.5 average. Kajohn Patton of Gompers Prep had the highest average, 27.7 for 20 games.

A list of other top scorers for the 2013-14 season can be found on home page’s basketball link.

Bill Walton and Larry Blum had more in common than just being among the crowd at the University of San Francisco’s National Invitation Tournament game recently.

Both are former San Diego Section basketball players of the year, Blum at Crawford in 1962-63 and Walton at Helix in 1969-70.

Blum set a San Diego Section record with 737 points and had a 23.8 average in Crawford’s 24-6-1 season that concluded with a championship-game,  64-44 victory over St. Augustine.

Walton averaged 29.1 points  and scored 960 points in leading  Helix to a 33-0 season.  Helix defeated Madison, 87-72, for the title in 1969 and repeated, 70-56 over Chula Vista in 1970.

Blum went on to play at the University of San Francisco and forged a highly successful career in the business world in the Bay Area.

Even in his ‘sixties, Blum still plays fullcourt basketball 2 or 3 nights a week and has a key to the USF gymnasium.

Walton became one of the most famous basketball players in history, winning championships at UCLA and with the Portland Trail Blazers and Boston Celtics in the NBA.

The 6-foot, 11-inch Walton and 5-11 Blum hooked up last week, when Louisiana State defeated USF, 71-63, in a NIT first-round game at which Walton served as analyst on the ESPN broadcast.

As Walton said during the broadcast, “There is my good friend, Larry Blum, who set all the high school scoring records in San Diego (which Walton broke) and had a successful career at USF and after graduation he produced the world famous Haight-Asbury street sign poster and has been very successful ever since.”

Wipeouts like these usually are reserved for the North Shore of Oahu.

San Diego Section boys basketball teams lost 10 of 11 games in the first round of the Southern California regional playoffs.

Girls teams helped ease the pain and won 6 of 14.

In four games in which San Diego boys teams had more favorable seeds their combined record was 1-3.

Mater Dei (29-2), the 4 seed in Division II, was the only area squad to win, defeating visiting Tustin (22-9), 59-50.

‘Dei will get a second home game Friday night when it takes on 5 seed Calabasas (28-5), which defeated Sylmar of the Los Angeles City Section, 57-54.

More negative reinforcement is expected Friday night when Open division play begins. No. 8 St. Augustine (29-3) is at 1 Santa Ana Mater Dei (31-0) and 6 La Costa Canyon (27-5) goers to Redondo Beach Redondo Union (24-5).

WOMEN PICK UP SLACK

No. 8 Mission Hills girls (23-8) won their 13^th in  a row, outlasting Alhambra Mark Keppel in Division-I, 54-50, and will move on with another road  game Friday at 1 Moreno Valley Canyon Springs (21-6), which outran Corona Centennial, 94-74.

Seven seed La Costa Canyon (26-3) is at 2 West Torrance (31-4) in D-II after a 53-51 win over Redondo Beach Redondo. The Warriors advanced with a 45-35 win over the L.A. City’s Bell.

Mount Miguel (26-5) will be home to 12 Selma (27-5) of the Central Section after the Matadors defeated visiting Yorba Linda, 52-45.  The 12^th-ranked Selma Bears upset 5 Inglewood, 58-53.

No. 6 Mater Dei (23-8)  moved on in D-IV to meet 3 Torrance Bishop Montgomery (24-8).  The Crusaders defeated 11 Fullerton Rosary (17-15), 48-44, and Bishop Monty blew out Exeter, 61-27.

D-V is a trip, if you’ll pardon the original 1960s expression.

Horizon, the 8 seed coming in with an 8-18 record, topped 9 San Bernardino Aquinas (27-3), 75-33.

The Panthers will meet the L.A. Ribet Fighting Frogs (22-8), the top seed.

The 5 seed Panthers dispatched 9 San Bernardino Aquinas (27-3), 75-33, while Ribet had a bye.

La Jolla Country Day (18-11), the Open Division winner last week in  San  Diego, was able to drop all the way to D-V and responded with a 63-19 victory as a 3 seed over L.A. Shalhevet (19-6).

The Torreys  have a 187-mile bus ride ahead before they can take on 6 Lancaster Edwards Air Force Base Desert (24-1), which ousted Lake Isabella Kern Valley, 35-11.

Yes, 35-11.

What goes around, comes around.

La Costa Canyon, ranked No. 1 in the first UT-San Diego basketball poll in December, is first again after vacating the top spot weeks ago.

The Mavericks defeated St. Augustine, 62-60, in the San Diego Section Open Division championship last week and received 10 first-place votes.  St. Augustine dropped to second and Mater Dei, which received three first-place votes, is third.

The first eight teams will be in Southern California playoffs beginning Wednesday. Morse, ranked ninth, and San Marcos, ranked 10th, played in the Division I final last week but were dissed by the state playoff committee.

**Points awarded on 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 basis
NR Not ranked.

Others receiving votes: Orange Glen, 8; Eastlake, 6; Foothills Christian, 2.

Thirteen sportswriters, sportscasters and CIF representatives from throughout San Diego County vote in the weekly poll:
John Maffei, Craig Malveaux and Don Norcross (U-T San Diego);
Terry Monahan (U-T San Diego stringer);
Bill Dickens, Andrew Smith (eastcountysports.com);
Steve Brand (San Diego Hall of Champions);
John Kentera and Jack Cronin (The Mighty 1090);
John Labeta (CIF San Diego Section office);
Rick Smith (Partletonsports.com);
Bodie DeSilva (sandiegopreps.com);
Aaron Burgin (fulltimehoops.tumblr.com).