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Health & Fitness

Lynbrook Girls Basketball Thrive as Underdogs

Season profile and summary of the Lynbrook High School Girls Varsity Basketball Team, who have qualified for the CIF Norcal Playoff tournament.

For the Lynbrook High School Girls Varsity basketball team, 2012-2013 has definitely been a season to remember. With an impressive 21-4 record, it’s the school’s best year in more than a decade, a run that has included 13 straight Central Coast Section playoff appearances since 2001.

Clearly the school is no stranger to success in girl’s basketball, notching a playoff win in each of the past four years. This year’s playoffs, however, are different for the Vikings.

In each of the past 12 seasons, Lynbrook competed in the Division II playoffs. This season, they were selected to California Interscholastic Federation’s new Open Division, in which the best teams from all divisions are placed in one tournament to decide a single, true CCS champion.

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Lynbrook was selected as the Open Division’s 8th team, the last and final seed, despite finishing the season with a 10-2 record and co-champion honors in the highly regarded De Anza Division of the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League.

Low expectations are nothing new for Lynbrook. First year head coach Cynthia Ting remembers, “The last two years we've had such success coming in as the underdog and taking down some of the top teams. The first year I was an assistant we beat St. Francis (Mountain View, CA) and last year we beat Presentation (San Jose, CA)”

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Both of those schools play in the West Catholic Athletic League, an all-private school league that features eight of the past nine CCS Division II champions in their league. Rightfully so, the league is viewed as a powerhouse in CCS sports.

Coming into this season, projections from Prep2Prep.com, Maxpreps.com and other local high school news sites ranked them just 4th in De Anza, despite returning 4 starters.

As junior center Sarah Dyslin says, “I think as a team we’ve definitely strived as an underdog.”

Friday night at Santa Teresa High School, their season culminated in one of the most memorable CCS playoff upsets in recent memory. Coming as the lowly eighth seed, the Vikings came away with a 46-44 victory over top seed Sacred Heart Cathedral (San Francisco, CA), yet another WCAL team.

Senior forward Jackie Hudepohl led the Vikings with 20 points as they rallied from an 8-point 4th quarter deficit. Junior Annie Cheng added two timely 3-pointers down the stretch, and Dyslin finished with the game with 13 points.

After the game, Ting said of her players, “Half the team has been here. They've seen it. I think they really said 'this is our year to prove that we can hang with the private schools.'”

Hudepohl added, “I think as a team we just played really well. We moved the ball well. My team did a great job of finding me and getting me open looks.”

Lynbrook continued their quest for the CCS Championship Wednesday night, falling to St. Francis High School 33-25 at Oak Grove High School. 

Friday night, they will play the consolation 3rd place game against at De Anza Co-Champion Wilcox High School. Win or lose, they are guaranteed an appearance in the NorCal Division II tournament.

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