Calabasas Hoops Is 4-0, With Big Plans

s boys basketball team is off to a great start.

The Coyotes are 4-0 including a 72-57 win Saturday over Campbell Hall in the championship game of the annual Campbell Hall tournament in North Hollywood—the fourth win by 15 points or more.

Calabasas begins Marmonte League competiton next Tuesday at Royal of Simi Valley as the Coyotes, coming off consecutive 20-win seasons, is favored to win the league title.

“Things are going well,” forward Joshua Cohan said. “We’re starting to play like we know we can, and we have really high expectations. We expect to win a lot of games because we’ve worked too hard and too long not to.”

In the championship win over Royal, point guard Jeremy Lieberman scored a career-high 22 points, as Calabasas rallied from eight points down in the second half.

“I think we should win the league this year,” said Leiberman, a sophomore returning starter. “It just feels pretty comfortable this year. If we really come together, I think we can win a state title.”

Lieberman hit a couple of key 3-pointers down the stretch against Campbell Hall, and tournament MVP Spencer Levy added 17 points (13 in the second half), Cohan scored 15 and Holden Israel chipped in 10.

Lieberman, the nephew of former All-City guard Zach Lieberman from Kennedy High, missed a month during the summer because of mononucleosis. But in terms of basketball, instead of looking at the illness as a negative because of lost court-time, Lieberman preferred looking at the bright side.

“It happened in the beginning of the summer, but after a while, I started to see how it helped me because I looked at basketball differently once it was taken away from me,” Lieberman said.

VIEWPOINT HOOPS IT UP

Like Calabasas, boys basketball team is performing well. The team is hosting its own Patriot Winter Tipoff Classic tournament, winning a first-round game over Hueneme 55-33 to improve to 4-1 heading into another tournament pool game at 6 p.m. today against visiting AGBU.

Viewpoint is coming off a runner-up finish at the Milken Community tournament last week in Los Angeles, losing the championship game 53-50 to Yeshiva.

“We had a really good week by making it all the way to the championship game,” Viewpoint coach J.J. Prince said. “It was a one-point game against Yeshiva with 20 seconds left, and we just couldn’t get that shot at the end.”

Prince said some of the top performers are Jack Borenstein, John Walsh and Tim Howell.

“Jack is doing very well. He’s averaging more than 20 points per game,” Prince said.

The Viewpoint tournament ends Saturday.