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SANTA CLARA — Archbishop Mitty has a lot to love about its basketball history, one steeped in tradition and championships.
But one game last February isn’t among its greatest hits.
Friday night, the Monarchs made sure there would be no repeat as they avoided a second consecutive upset in the first round of the Central Coast Section Open Division playoffs with a 69-38 rout of No. 8 seed Menlo School at Santa Clara High.
Nigel Burris, a 6-foot-7 junior, scored 18 points off the bench and Marcus Greene added 16 points to lead Mitty into the semifinals Wednesday against No. 4 seed Menlo-Atherton, which prevailed in overtime against No. 5 Serra.
A year earlier, as the No. 1 seed in this same round, Mitty lost to Sacred Heart Cathedral.
But that was a different team and a different mindset.
The Monarchs were locked in Friday, leading nearly the entire way. They broke it open in the second half against an opponent they defeated by a similar margin in the second game of the season.
“It’s playoff time,” Burris said. “That’s the time we have to be in crush mode. Every single game we have to be in tip-top shape. Everything that we’ve worked on — preseason, regular season — it’s all up to here. We’ve got to show what we can do now.”
Mitty built quite a résumé this winter, winning at Bellarmine and Archbishop Riordan in the second half of the season to grab a share of the West Catholic Athletic League championship with those teams and receive the No. 1 seed in the section’s top playoff division once again.
Coach Tim Kennedy sensed his players were ready at practice Thursday and their focus carried over to the court.
“Different guys stepped up when other guys struggled,” Kennedy said. “You saw Marcus Greene and Nigel Burris have two big games. Guys just made simple plays and simple works in the postseason. Any time we got out of rhythm is when we were trying to do too much.
“Yesterday’s practice was a great one, so I was pretty confident going in that it wasn’t going to be a focus issue. Also today during shootaround guys were locked in. I was happy with the guys, where their mindset was. It was a different feel from where we were last year.”
And, of course, a much different result.
