Surprise team from the Central Valley, meet your counterparts from Los Angeles County. That's the scenario facing Hanford West High School's boys basketball team in Tuesday's opening round of the California Interscholastic Federation Southern California Division III playoffs.

The Central Section champion Huskies (20-11), seeded No. 4, host Gahr (Cerritos) in one of three SoCal regional games to be played in Kings County Tuesday night.

As expected, Hanford's girls (25-4) got the No. 3 seed in the Division II tournament and plays Beverly Hills (24-9) on Tuesday, with the winner most likely getting a Thursday game at No. 2 Brea Olinda (29-2).

Corcoran (28-6) also got a No. 4 seed and hosts Pacific Hills (22-10) from West Hollywood in Division IV action.

All games start at 7 p.m. Athletic directors Beau Hill of Hanford and Lance Dowd of Hanford West said tickets, at $9 for adults and $5 for students and seniors 60 and over, will be sold at the gate on game night.

Just like the Huskies, who struggled midway through the season, but enter regionals with a six-game win streak, the Gladiators (18-15) are peaking late.

All four of Gahr's wins in the Southern Section Division III-A playoffs came on the road, including a 63-62 win over top-seeded Diamond Ranch (Pomona) in the quarterfinals.

Gahr lost the title game to Harvard-Westlake (North Hollywood), the top seed in the SoCal bracket, 87-65 on Saturday.

"We're going to be playing a very athletic team," said Hanford West Tim Caudillo. "I talked to Pat Geill at Memorial, who's played them, and he said they're even longer than Sunnyside."

Caudillo has plenty of sources for a scouting report on the Gladiators, who crossed path with Hanford West foes Memorial (Fresno), Hoover (Fresno) and Hanford at the Clovis Elks Christmas Classic in late December.

Gahr beat Memorial and Hoover, but lost to Hanford. The Huskies lost to Memorial in the Kings County Classic in mid-December and lost twice to Hanford in West Yosemite League play, but beat Hoover in the Division III semifinals last week.

Senior forward Devin Glolston (6-foot-6), who scored 32 points in the 75-69 loss to Hanford, is averaging 24.4 points per game.

It's Hanford West's second trip to SoCals, but their first home game. The Huskies lost 68-54 at La Canada (La Canada Flintridge) two years ago.

"We had Rodney (Webster) and Warren (Moon) up for those games," Caudillo said.

Awaiting the winner is a Thursday game against the winner of the game between top-seeded Harvard-Westlake and Ridgeview (Bakersfield). The SoCal title game will be played at noon Saturday at Pauley Pavilion on the campus of the University of California Los Angeles, in Westwood.

Hanford draws a Beverly Hills team that lost to undefeated Mater Dei (Santa Ana), the top seed in the tournament as well as the No. 1 team in the state by Cal-Hi Sports, 81-42 in the Division II-A finals on Friday.

The Normans - who hail from ZIP code 90212, not 90210, and whose campus features an oil well and a gym with a 25-yard swimming pool underneath the basketball floor - are led by 5-8 sophomore forward Morgan Mason, who averages 15.6 points per game.

It's alumni include political figures Jack Abramoff and H.R. Haldelman, Hollywood stars Corbin Bernsen, Nicolas Cage, Shaun Cassidy, Jamie Lee Curtis, Angelina Jolie, Alicia Silverstone, Tori Spelling and Betty White, musicians Andre Previn and Lenny Kravitz, journalists Liz Claman and Daryn Kagan, and Lyle and Erik Mendenez.

The winner of Tuesday's game takes on the winner of a game between Brea Olinda and an outbracket game tonight between Roosevelt (East Los Angeles) and Mt. Miguel (Spring Valley) on Thursday. The SoCal title game will be played Saturday at 2 p.m. at Pauley Pavilion.

Pacific Hills (most noted alum: Monica Lewinsky) was ranked No. 9 in the state in Division IV by Cal-Hi Sports before losing 59-57 to Harvard-Westlake in the Southern Section Division IV-A title game Friday.

The Bruins have two players, guards Bree Richardson (daughter of former UCLA and NBA star Pooh Richardson) and Ariel Dale, who have received Division I scholarships, Richardson at UC Santa Barbara and Dale at Fordham.

Richardson is averaging 13.3 points per game and Dale 11.3, but Pacific Hills' top gun is senior Joanna Miller, who's averaging 19.1 points per game.

The winner of the Pacific Hills-Corcoran game plays the winner of Tuesday's game between The Bishop's School (San Diego) and the winner of tonight's outbracket game between St. Joseph (Santa Maria) and the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies (21-9).

The SoCal Division IV final will be played Saturday at 5 p.m. at California State University, Fullerton.

(March 9, 2009)