BOYS BASKETBALL

After being down for multiple seasons, strike one for Heritage’s Eagles.

They took down Highlands Ranch 70-64 in overtime on Friday night, knocking off the No. 6 team in The Denver Post Class 5A coaches poll.

Eli Ziegler’s 21 points led Heritage to the Continental League victory. Th Eagles are 6-9 overall, 1-2 in the league. Josh Steward added 11 points and Ryan Singer had 10.

Highlands Ranch dipped to 10-4, 2-1.

Also in the Continental, ThunderRidge moved to 3-0 as Zach Rusk scored 22 points in a 66-54 win over Legacy. Regis Jesuit also moved to 3-0 in league with a 64-57 decision at defending 5A state champion Chaparral. Mountain Vista (14-0) stayed undefeated with a 84-48 thrashing of Littleton. And Ponderosa handled Catsle View 43-31.

In the Centennial, Arapahoe, the 2011-12 state runner-up, kept the league interesting with a 53-44 victory at Grandview. And Roderick Bernstine’s 31 points lifted Cherokee Trail past Mullen 74-56.

Monarch, one of the stories of the season to date, moved to 13-2overall, 8-0 in th Front Range, after a 62-48 victory over Fort Collins. Kyle Billingsley led the way with 17 points.

Rangeview advanced to 12-3 overall, 3-0 in the East Metro, after a 70-41 victory over Thornton. Trey Bridges and Jeremiah Page each had 15 points for the Raiders.

GIRLS BASKETBALL

In Class 5A: Highlands Ranch had nine different plaers score in a 69-25 rout of Heritage. Kelsey Wainright led the Falcons with 13 points. … Elsewhere in the Continental, Regis Jesuit sneaked by Chaparral 59-56.

Another outstanding night in the Front Range League, Horizon edged Fossil Ridge 60-55; Loveland improved to 13-2 hanging on for a 63-60 win at Legacy; Nicole Lange scored a game high 17 point for Fort Collins, which dispatched of Monarch 66-58. …

In Class 4A: Mikala Gordon scored 25 points and Shannon Patterson added 21 for Pueblo South in a 78-30 South Central League whipping of Pueblo Central. … Mesa Ridge outscored Wasson 27-0 in the first quarter and rolled to a 66-19 victory. Kylee Shook had 11 points and 12 rebounds. … Big win out west for Delta. The Panthers stayed unbeaten in the Western Slope League with a 49-44 win over Delta.

In Class 3A: 2A Lutheran scored a huge Metropolitan League win over Bishop Machebeuf 37-29. Jennifer Vigil led the Lions with 11 points. … In the Tri-Peaks, Lamar upended St. Mary’s 32-30. … Sophomore Maya Godina scored a game high 12 for Salida in a defensive 27-20 victory over The Classical Academy.

In the small school ranks: Caliche stayed perfect with a 64-40 win over Fleming. Shayln Johnson led the Buffs with 15 points. Jenna Zink and Shaney Stumpf each had 12 points for Caliche. … A very nice win for the Kit Carson Wilcats, 42-34 over McClave.

Sorry for the shortness of this one, the flubug has finally bitten yours truly, and its time for bed …

GIRLS BASKETBALL

In 2011-12, Broomfield just couldn’t figure out Centaurus, losing to the Warriors twice; ultimately costing them the Northern League title.

On Thursday, it appeared to be more of the same when Centaurus went to the locker rooms up 22-15 on its home court.

But Mike Croell’s Eagles responded with a stellar defensive effort in the second half and outscored Centaurus 25-15 in the final 16 minutes to score a 40-37 win and improve to 14-1 overall and 6-0 in the league. The Warriors drop to 10-5 overall and third in the league at 4-2.

Freshman Brenna Chase was the only Eagles player in double figures with 13 points. Read more…

Christian McCaffrey, the star running back from Valor Christian, will take a visit to Alabama this weekend.

“Headed down to Alabama tomorrow to visit!” McCaffrey tweeted Thursday afternoon. “Can’t wait to see what the National Champions have to offer! #RollTide”

Former Valor Christian quarterback Luke Del Rio is walking on to Alabama’s team and is already enrolled there.

McCaffrey is expected to be Colorado’s top recruit in the class of 2014. He is the reigning All-Colorado player of the year, and was also named the state’s Gatorade player of the year after scoring 41 total touchdowns.

He has offers from 14 schools, according to Rivals.com. Colorado, Colorado State and Northern Colorado are among those offers, as are schools like Stanford, Iowa, Nebraska, Vanderbilt and Washington. He does not have an offer from Alabama, according to Rivals.com. Read more…

Joey O’Connor, pictured during his senior year at Windsor. (Denver Post file photo)

Joey O’Connor has requested a transfer from Ohio State’s football program, according to the school.

O’Connor, a star offensive lineman from Windsor, redshirted his freshman year last fall after having surgery on his left knee. He was a member of the 2011 All-Colorado football team and was nationally ranked by every major recruiting service.

In an announcement sent to media covering the program, the school said the 6-foot-5, 305-pound O’Connor “has requested a transfer to be closer to home.”

O’Connor’s dad, Joe, told MyWindsorNow.com last November that Joey had a difficult first year at Ohio State.

“It was incredibly frustrating for him,” Joe O’Connor told the site. “Couple that with homesickness, being X amount of miles away from his comfort zone, it was real difficult the first couple of months. For any freshman, whether they’re playing ball or not, I’m sure that’s a factor. Couple that with an injury, that just made it ever harder.”

Later, Joe O’Connor added: “The change in culture coming from a Colorado small town, you know Windsor and Eaton, farming community to metropolitan Columbus. All the kids that he deals with are not from small communities. They’re from Cincinnati, they’re from Columbus, they’re from Cleveland, they’re from Fort Lauderdale. That’s basically his biggest challenge is meshing with those metropolitan-type kids. He’s listed as the country kid coming from Colorado out west. It was definitely a culture shock all across the board.”

Joey O’Connor had a long road to get to Ohio State. He was originally a Penn State commit, but then the child sexual-abuse scandal rocked that program and he reopened his recruitment.

O’Connor was offered by both Colorado and Colorado State out of high school. (CSU is a half-hour from Windsor’s campus.) At that time, though, he wanted to leave the state.

“He just really felt that he knew what was in Colorado, and he wanted something outside of that, something beyond that,” Joey’s mom, Ann, said last January.

BOYS BASKETBALL

The Monarch Coyotes have a flare for the dramatic. Four days after holding off Fairview in an emotionally charged atmosphere, the Coyotes were pushed to the brink on Tuesday night at home against Poudre.

The Impalas got a buzzer-beating three-pointer from Lake Reed to send the game into overtime, but Monarch had enough in the tank to score a 57-54 victory.

Ben Beauchamp’s team high 20 paced Monarch, who also got 16 points from Jay MacIntyre. BoCo’s Paul Willis was on hand in Louisville. Read more…

WRESTLING

Even this late in the season, team are heading out of state to try their mettle against – in this case – the West’s best.

Broomfield went to Orem, Utah and Utah Valley University’s “The Rumble and finished fourth in the 68 team tournament. Read more…

BOYS BASKETBALL

Zach Braxton had 23 points and 20 rebounds as Highlands Ranch opened the Class 5A Continental League season with a 65-55 victory over defending state champion Chaparral.

Braxton’s numbers were Charles Barkley-like as the Falcons improved to 9-3. Evan Motlong added 18 points for Highlands Ranch. Brandon Malone led the Wolverines with 23 and Jake Holtzmann added 14.

Taylor Jenson’s 16 points led four Legend Titans in double figures in a 78-57 whipping of Littleton in the Continental. Also, ThunderRidge whipped Douglas County 79-51; Ponderosa handled Rock Canyon 51-28; Regis Jesuit (Josh Perkins 25 points) easily handled Castle View 78-21; and Mountain Vista (Jake Pemberton 17 points) moved to 12-0 overall with an 86-71 decision of Heritage.

In the 5A Front Range, Fossil Ridge used a late rally to outlast Loveland 75-62; Legacy (Travis Baum and Andrew Hebel, nine points each) had no double-figure scorers, but downed Mountain Range 53-50; and Fort Collins (Ryan French 22 points) tamed Rocky Mountain 66-51. Read more…

The new coach at Central (G.J.) is certainly familiar with football in the area.

The school on Friday announced that Shawn Marsh would be taking over the Warriors’ program, according to multiple reports on Twitter.

Marsh, most recently the offensive coordinator and interim coach at Colorado Mesa University in 2011, was the head coach at Fruita Monument in 2010 and at Grand Junction from 2001-07. In 2005, his Grand Junction team went 13-1 and reached the Class 4A final before losing to ThunderRidge, 51-21.

Marsh has also been a head coach at Paonia.

Grand Junction Central went 0-10 as a 4A team in 2012, and is 5-25 over the past three seasons. The Warriors haven’t had a winning season since going 8-4 in 2004.

Josh Perkins. (Karl Gerhing, The Denver Post)

Josh Perkins, Regis Jesuit boys basketball’s junior star, has narrowed his list of schools to nine, according to the Aurora Sentinel and Scout.com.

Those schools, per the Sentinel: Arizona, Colorado, Denver, Duke, Gonzaga, Kansas, Minnesota, New Mexico and Stanford.

All but Duke have offered, according to Rivals.com, ESPN.com and Scout.com.

Perkins, a 6-foot-2, 175-pound combo guard, is averaging a Class 5A-leading 25.3 points, as well as 5.8 assists, 7.7 rebounds and 1.1 steals per game for the eighth-ranked Raiders (9-3). Tuesday, he scored 27 points and had nine rebounds and six assists in a 74-61 win over George Washington. Kansas coach Bill Self was there to watch. Read more…

Ashi Geberdine of Denver East has been named Colorado’s Gatorade boys corss country runner of the year.

He’s the first Angel to be honored in the 28-year history of the award and is eligible to be name national runner of the year, which will be announced later this month.

The 6-foot-2 senior raced to the Class 5A individual state championship this past season with a time of 16:21.7. Geberkidane also won the Denver Public Schools championship and the Region 1 championship in 5A. He was 12th at the Nike Cross Nationals Midwest Regional championships.

Geberkidane, who has a 3.86 GPA, also is a soccer standout. He has volunteered locally on behalf of a youth-mentoring program. Read more…