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    El Dorado girls basketball wins regional title with second-half rally
    • March 11, 2026

    PLACENTIA – The El Dorado girls basketball team barely made it into the playoffs, but now it has made it all the way to a CIF State championship game.

    The Golden Hawks put their heart and determination on display again Tuesday, coming back from a 14-point, third-quarter deficit to beat Leuzinger, 61-56, in the CIF Southern California Regional Division III championship game at El Dorado High.

    El Dorado (23-14) will play Valley Christian of San Jose (17-15) in the CIF State Division III final at Golden 1 Center, home of the NBA’s Sacramento Kings, on Friday at 2 p.m.

    It will be the first CIF State girls basketball championship game for El Dorado.

    El Dorado coach Matt Raya talked about how his team’s players “have been playing with their backs all of the second half of the year.”

    “They are resilient, man,” Raya said. “We had so many must-win games.”

    The Golden Hawks finished third in the four-team Century League with a 2-6 league record. They qualified for the CIF Southern Section playoffs as an at-large team. El Dorado went on to win the CIF-SS Division 4 championship and continued to win through the SoCal Division III Regional.

    Three players scored all of El Dorado’s points.

    Senior guard Delaney Shiring scored 26 points with five 3-point baskets and seven rebounds. Senior guard Kennedy Wood scored 25 points with five 3-pointers. And another Golden Hawks senior guard, Riley Morikawa, scored 10 points with two 3s.

    They trailed by 14 points, 39-25, midway through the third quarter. Then the rally started. El Dorado scored the quarter’s final eights to make it 42-38, Leuzinger, going into the fourth quarter.

    Wood scored 11 points in the fourth quarter. Shiring, who will continue her basketball career at Pomona-Pitzer, scored eight points including a 3 that tied it, 49-49. Wood made a 3 to put the Golden Hawks up, 52-49, with 3:20 remaining.

    In the final minute Wood made three free throw and Shiring also made three foul shots to keep El Dorado on track for the victory.

    Wood transferred from Orangewood Academy to El Dorado after her sophomore year when Orangewood Academy shut down its athletics program.

    “I knew when I came over here we were going to make history,” she said. “And we did.”

    El Dorado was 7 for 8 at the free-throw line in the fourth quarter.

    Leuzinger finished 23-15. Sovereign Wood led Leuzinger with 15 points. Tatayana Aubry, averaging 21 points, scored 12 points with six rebounds for the Olympians

    Leuzinger was able to score inside for much of the game and had a 30-18 lead at halftime. The Golden Hawks then went to a zone defense.

    “If they were going to beat us,” Raya said, “they were going to beat us from outside.”

    Leuzinger was 1 for 7 on 3-point shots in the second half.

    Overall, Leuzinger was 19 for 53 on all shots and 5 for 15 on 3s,. El Dorado made 16 of its 48 shots from the floor and was 9 for 29 on 3-point tries.

     

     Orange County Register 

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