Mira Costa boys, girls in Open Division bracket

The Mira Costa boys and girls soccer teams were selected for the CIF Southern Section Open Division, which will be have a different look than the other divisions.

The Bay League champion Mustangs are the fourth seed in the bracket, which is going to be played with a new format.

The eight team-bracket will start with a home-andhome series in the opening round. For Mira Costa, that means opening Wednesday on the road at Aliso Niguel. The series will shift to Mira Costa for Friday's game.

At the end of the opening series, the team with the most goals scored in the series will advance.

After the opening homeand-home, the division will revert to one-game quarterfinals (Feb. 13) and semifinals (Feb. 16) before the final on Feb. 23 at Veterans Stadium.

The other series in the Open Division: GodinezArlington; JSerra-San Clemente and Montclair-Mater Dei.

“It's a little bit of a bummer that it can't be a bit more expansive to include more teams, but to be one of the eight, I'll take it,” Mira Costa coach Al Brown said.

Mira Costa posted a 221-3 overall record and went 9-0-1 in the Bay League. The lone loss came against JSerra, which is in the bottom half of the bracket.

“The way I look at it, after 160 minutes, the better team is going to win,” Brown said. “We're excited about it. I definitely think this is better than last year's (Division 1 bracket) with 16 teams, single elimination.”

On the girls side, fifthseeded Mira Costa (15-13, 8-1-1 Bay), one of three South Bay teams on the recent Open Division watch list, survived the cut after winning the Bay League.

Mira Costa's only loss this season came to Palos Verdes, 1-0, in the first round of Bay League play. The Mustangs went 6-0-1 after that loss to win the league title.

The Mustangs will open Thursday at home against Millikan. The second game will be played at Millikan on Saturday.

The other quarterfinal series include: Oaks ChristianSanta Margarita, Los Alamitos-Capistano Valley and Mater Dei-Santiago/Corona.

The girls quarterfinals are Feb. 14 and semifinals are Feb. 17.

Both the girls and boys Open Division final will be played Feb. 23 at Veterans Stadium.

PHOTO BY ROBERT CASILLAS Marco Bottene, left, and Jack Johnstone, shown celebrating a recent goal, helped lead Mira Costa to the No. 4seed in the CIF-SS Open Division playoffs, which start Wednesday.