Six high school basketball games Saturday at Arco Arena decided the Northern California boys and girls representatives for next week's state championships at RaboBank Arena in Bakersfield.

Four more games were played Saturday at Folsom High to determine the remaining NorCal representatives against the Southern region.

For these basketball players, it was the biggest day of their lives. 

The Sacramento-area representatives struggled throughout the day until the Oak Ridge High Trojan girls team advanced to the Division I championships with a hard-fought 52-42 victory over the longtime NorCal power Berkeley Yellowjackets.

It's amazing to watch what high-school basketball has become. 

Then again, the same can be said of life.

However, on some high-school basketball teams, there are nearly double-digit figure coaching staffs.

For a sport in which five players perform on a court, there are teams with nine or 10 coaches. One question: When a player has all these guys screaming at him, to whom does he listen? If they are screaming about different topics, isn't this player more confused than before the screaming began?

C'mon, now.

Fortunately, for the girls and boys, it does not appear to diminish the enjoyment of competition, win or lose.

Whether the games were close or decided by large margins, for the most part, sportsmanship and leaving all the effort on the court were the orders of the day.

The Sacramento High School girls opened the action at Arco and were no match for the nation's No. 1 ranked team, St. Mary's (Stockton). The Lady Dragons were not able to handle the relentless full-court defensive pressure for which St. Mary's is known and committed 38 turnovers on the way to a 70-45 defeat for the Girls Division III title.

The Sac High boys engaged in an up-and-down battle with Bishop O'Dowd (Oakland) and held a 50-49 lead with two minutes remaining, but never again scored before falling 57-50 in a battle of Dragons. Josiah Turner led the Sac High Dragons with 20 points, while 6-8 sophomore Brandon Ashley had 13 points and 13 rebounds for the O'Dowd Dragons, who were led in rebounding by Jordan Barton's 14.

O'Dowd won the Boys Division III game by dominating the boards, 57-to-28.

The next two games of the day at Arco were the most exciting. Carondelet (Concord) won the Girls Division II title in a 40-38 thriller against Archbishop Mitty (San Jose). Meanwhile, St. Francis (Mountain View) scored on a put-back at the buzzer by Patrick Crowley to defeat Woodcreek (Roseville), 48-47. 

Oak Ridge's Sara James scored 16 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, and was joined by solid play from teammates as the Trojans overcame a slow start to defeat Berkeley with consistent play down the stretch. Oak Ridge held the Yellowjackets to one of 17 field-goal shooting in the fourth quarter to move away from a two-point game at the start of the fourth quarter.

Caitlin Welsch scored a game-high 19 points and had eight rebounds for Oak Ridge.

In the final game at Arco for the hotly contested Boys Division I title, Newark Memorial defeated De La Salle (Concord),58-49.  The teams displayed a physical brand of ball that overwhelmed an officiating crew that never again should be allowed to work a playoff game. 

It's incredible no injuries were suffered since the officials never established a line of what was and wasn't a foul.

Newark Memorial used full-court defensive pressure to force 18 first-half turnovers by De La Salle and take a 43-22 lead into the fourth quarter. Then De La Salle became the physical aggressor, showing on multiple occasions how it once fashioned a 100-plus-victory football streak. The Spartans cut the lead to five, but never could get closer.

For more information on next week's state championship games, go to cifstate.org.