SAN DIEGO -- Rancho Bernardo High School’s academic teams swept the North County Academic League championships for the second year in a row this week, a feat never before accomplished in the 26-year history of the NCAL.

The Broncos won the freshman, junior varsity, and varsity titles for the 24-school league in tournaments that were held Tuesday and Thursday at Rancho Bernardo High School.

Rancho Bernardo’s varsity team will represent North County in the San Diego County Academic League playoffs on Thursday, April 30, against the champions from South Bay, East County, and City Schools. The matches will take place in the ITV studios at the San Diego County Office of Education, with the final match broadcast live at 7 pm on ITV, Channel 16.

In the NCAL championship match on Thursday night, the Broncos, who won the NCAL’s Inland Division during the regular season, defeated San Dieguito Academy, 126-103, to successfully defend its league title. Eight of the top teams in the NCAL participated in the playoffs.

Rancho Bernardo’s road to the championship began with a quarterfinals win over Fallbrook, 159-75. Next up for the Broncos was Canyon Crest Academy, the champion of the Coast Division. The Broncos defeated the Ravens, 126-100, to qualify for the final.

San Dieguito Academy made it to the finals by holding off Westview, 120-105, in the quarterfinals. That was followed by an exciting 104-100, win that was decided on the last question against Coast Division rival Carlsbad.

The other quarterfinal matches saw Canyon Crest beat Escondido, 173-7; and Carlsbad defeat North Division champ Rancho Buena Vista, 148-46.

Rancho Bernardo’s champion varsity team consists of Alex Chang, Jennifer Ding, Kevin Gong, Noopur Gupta, Andy Leu, Haochi Shi, Oleg Stens, Zhao Zheng, and 2008 “Jeopardy!” Teen Champion, Anurag Kashyap. The Broncos are coached by Yvonne Eibeck.

JV and Freshmen

On Tuesday, Rancho Bernardo’s junior varsity team successfully defended its title with a hard-fought 92-81 win over Torrey Pines. The Falcons, the tournament’s wildcard team from the Coast Division, defeated the North Division’s champ, Mission Hills, 100-28, in the semifinal round. In the other semifinal match, Inland Division champion Rancho Bernardo downed Coast Division winner Carlsbad, 105-62.

The JV champion Rancho Bernardo team consists of Stella Au, Julia Brown, Lucas Brown, Kevin Chang, Ilene Chen, Chelsea Choi, Tiffany Dharma, Kevin Hsieh, Elie Keck, Natalie Keehan, Albert Liang, Kelley Luyken, Jarred Mihalik, Andrew Ng, Sumukh Sathnur, Tim Shen, and Vivian Yu. The Broncos are coached by Diane Hotz and Yvonne Eibeck.

Also on Tuesday, Rancho Bernardo successfully defended its freshman championship title, 68-49, over the wildcard team, Carlsbad, in the final. The Lancers entered the championship match coming off a 69-16 win over North Division champ Rancho Buena Vista in the semifinal round. The Broncos, meanwhile, won a nail-biter, 55-49, over Coast champion Torrey Pines in the semi’s.

Rancho Bernardo’s NCAL freshman champion team members are John Akagi, Douglas Bi, Carrie Chen, Jenny Cui, William Creed, Helen Gang, David Hu, Yifan Huang, Dayoung Lee, Komal Obbad, Nicolas Ong, Seth Padmabandu, Vivek Rangaswamy, and Manal Rasheed. The Broncos are coached by Anureg Kashyap and Zhao Zhang.

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