CIF Southern Section boys basketball brackets released: Centennial, Harvard-Westlake top two Open seeds
Defending State Open Division champion Corona Centennial got the nod over 28-1 Harvard-Westlake (Studio City) for the top spot in 2023 CIF Southern Section Open Division championships, which were just announced Sunday by the section office.
The Open Division field was actually announced on Friday. Sunday the seedings was announced, along with the two four-team pool play schedule, which begins on Friday. The winners of Pool A and Pool B meet Feb. 25 at the Honda Center for the championship.
Centennial (25-3) heads up Pool A and hosts two-time state champion and Bronny James-led Sierra Canyon-Chatsworth (20-7) on Friday, while fifth-seed Notre Dame-Sherman Oaks (20-9) travels to fourth-seed Bishop Montgomery-Torrance (25-2).
In Pool B, second-seed Harvard Westlake-Studio City hosts No. 7 St. Bernard-Playa del Rey (21-5) and No. 6 St. John Bosco-Bellflower (24-4) travels to No. 3 West Ranch-Valencia (26-1).
Harvard-Westlake's Brady Dunlap in a victory over Sierra Canyon earlier this season. Photo: Nick Koza
All eight teams in the Open Division advance to CIF Southern California Regional play, which begins Feb. 28. Centennial entered last week No. 9 in the SBLive Power 25 National Rankings and Harvard-Westlake No. 15.
The section also released the brackets of the nine other 32-team brackets. First-round play of those divisions begins Wednesday — there are a small smattering of play-in games starting Tuesday — for the two-week tournament.
With close to 300 teams, this is the largest boys high school basketball tournament in the country.
Below are links to all of the remaining nine divisions, which are regulation single-elimination tournaments. Multiple teams in each division will advance to regional play.
REST OF 2023 CIF SOUTHERN SECTION BOYS BRACKETS
