Name’s the same for Metro’s best
Niamey Harris and Najee Harris are not related and have never met. But in addition to sharing a last name, they were also responsible for some of the Bay Area’s best high school moments in 2016-17.
Niamey won AAA Player of the Year awards in football and basketball for a second straight year — no one else has done so even once — and led Mission to the San Francisco Section’s first state basketball title with a resounding postseason that earned him a spot on The Chronicle’s All-Metro first team.
Najee, the nation’s No. 1 football recruit from Antioch, backed up his preseason hype with 2,766 rushing yards and 36 total touchdowns while winning his second straight Metro Player of the Year award. As he promised, Harris graduated early and kept his commitment to attend Alabama.
The Harrises shared similar upbringings — raised in tough neighborhoods by single moms — and each displayed a strong, quiet, yet forceful presence to lead their teams to prominence.
“Niamey epitomized what the program was all about,” Mission basketball coach Arnold Zelaya said. “He simply wouldn’t let us lose.”
Najee left as the Bay Area’s career rushing leader (7,948 yards), passing such greats as Jahvid Best, Dick Bass, O.J. Simpson, Marshawn Lynch and Maurice Jones-Drew. He also turned around the Antioch program: After going 1-9 when he was a freshman, the Panthers were 26-11 in the next three seasons.
“I don’t think anyone could have made a greater impact on a school or community,” Antioch offensive coordinator Brett Dudley said.
For a look at other schools, players and moments that made headlines,
St. Patrick-St. Vincent surprise
Buoyed by a strong senior class, the small Catholic school in Vallejo figured to have a good athletic year. But winning state division titles in football and basketball — the first for boys programs in school history — and reaching the North Coast Section baseball championship game was startling. The one common thread among all of them was senior receiver/safety, shooting guard and infielder Marquel Johnson. “We have a lot of guys who grew up together in the area, and we’ve had a lot of success,” Johnson said. “We’ve also had some really good coaches and great support systems.”
Spoiler alert
Drake-San Anselmo’s baseball team not only spoiled the perfect-season bid of Miramonte-Orinda by winning the NCS Division 3 title game, but also ruined the perfect send-off for longtime coach Vince Dell’Aquila. MCAL Pitcher of the Year Ryan McLaughlin threw a four-hitter with eight strikeouts and had a key two-run double to lead Drake to a 4-3 victory. Drake (25-5) set a school record for wins, handed the Matadors (27-1) their only loss and, in the semifinals, ended Analy-Sebastopol’s 18-game win streak.
Track and field
Lincoln senior Pamela Amaechi (shot put) and Pittsburg senior Iffy Joyner (discus) became the first Bay Area girl and boy to win throwing events at the same state meet. Amaechi, who won the state discus title as a junior, unleashed a career-best 47-foot, 5¼-inch throw on her final attempt, and Joyner topped 200 feet for the first time (203-8) on his next-tolast effort.
St. Mary’s-Berkeley senior and Cal-bound Sanjay Kettles won the state boys long jump at 24-3¾ on his final attempt. It set the tone for a terrific Bay Area showing with 30 medals, including golds for California-San Ramon junior Alyssa Brewer (800, 2:07.07), Heritage-Brentwood junior Jeff Charvet (800, 1:51.07) and the Bishop O’Dowd-Oakland girls 1,600 relay team (3:46.33).
St. Joseph Notre Dame-Alameda senior Cooper Teare didn’t repeat as the state 3,200 champion, but was the national leader (8:41.46) after a win at the Arcadia Invitational and just missed a sub-4-minutes mile while winning at the Mt. SAC Relays in 4:00.16.
El Cerrito senior Kaylah Robinson had the nation’s third-fastest high school 100meter hurdles time with a wind-aided 12.98 in the state final, but lost to Tara Davis (12.83) of Agoura. Robinson and Teare will be at Oregon in the fall.
Bye-bye, Kyree
Just a few weeks after being named MaxPreps’ national basketball Freshman of the Year, Moreau Catholic’s 6foot-6 Kyree Walker transferred to Hillcrest Prep in Phoenix. Walker averaged 21.5 points and 6.6 rebounds for the NorCal Division 2 champions.
Mission basketball
No Bay Area basketball team drew more attention than the Bears, who pulled off consecutive playoff upsets in packed gyms at top-seed St Ignatius (64-54) and at second-seed Vanden-Fairfield (72-68) before a resounding 82-75 Division 3 state-title win over Villa Park at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento.
The Bears (35-1) were honored at City Hall and by the Warriors and finished No. 1 in The Chronicle’s rankings for the first time, and coach Arnold Zelaya was selected state boys basketball Coach of the Year by Cal-Hi Sports.
State football: 4 up, 4 down
The advent of the 13-division bowl game system opened the door for state championships and four Metro teams returned with titles.
Bishop O’Dowd-Oakland got three touchdowns from sophomore running back Austin Jones in a 43-24 Division 5-AA win over Valley View-Moreno Valley, and McClymonds used strong secondary play and a kickoff return for a touchdown by Devin White to beat La Jolla Country Day 20-17 in Division 5-A.
St. Patrick-St. Vincent won the Division 6-A title, beating Strathmore 29-28 on a 19-yard field goal by Gabe Fuentes with six seconds to play, and Campolindo-Moraga (4-AA) beat Bakersfield Christian 31-7 behind two interceptions and a TD catch by John Torchio.
Losing in their title games were Valley Christian (2-AA), Serra (2-A), Menlo-Atherton (3-AA) and De La Salle-Concord, which was beaten 56-33 in the Open Division by St. John Bosco-Bellflower for the second time in four years.
Stunning finish
On its way to making its case for being perhaps the Bay Area’s best-ever girls basketball team, Mitty (28-3) lost the Open Division final 44-40 to Clovis West, failing to score a basket in the final 5:42 after taking a 37-30 lead. Mitty (28-3) was No. 1 nationally in the MaxPreps computer rankings coming in and Clovis West No. 2. Sophomore Haley Jones and senior Maddy Holland were first-team All-Metro players on a deep, talented team that couldn’t connect down the stretch.
“We all we got, we all we need”
The Kennedy-Richmond football team, pushed by a couple of young coaches with the credo “We all we got, we all we need,” went 10-2 and won its first playoff game since 1988 — which was also the last time it had a winning record. A team forced to deal with personal strife and gun violence, the Eagles outscored opponents 399-104. In the previous seven seasons combined, Kennedy was 25-47.
Emotional title
Menlo School-Atherton won its second straight Central Coast Section Division II baseball title, beating Burlingame 1-0 in the final. It was led by first-year coach Sean Riley, whose 20-year-old son, Calvin, had been shot and killed in San Francisco 10 months earlier. Riley, a former Serra assistant, took the job to take his mind away from the tragedy. AllMetro first-team pitcher Griff McGarry pitched a three-hitter in the title game.
Farewells
The year ended with the deaths of three prominent figures: Jim Liggett, the state’s winningest softball coach, from Carlmont-Belmont; former Riordan and Stanford football and track athlete and scholar Tyrone McGraw (who was only 29); and longtime El Cerrito football coach and community leader George Austin.