Girls' basketball: What is this, China?

BAKERSFIELD--Tough questions apparently aren't allowed here at the state basketball championships. Or even obvious ones.

Fred Robledo, a reporter from the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, was attempting to ask Bishop Amat Coach Richard Wiard about suffering the worst defeat in a girls' basketball state championship game when he was cut off mid-sentence by a California Interscholastic Federation official.

The official told him he wasn't allowed to ask that question after Stockton St. Mary's walloped Bishop Amat, 89-41, in the Division III title game, setting records for most points in a championship and biggest margin of victory. The fourth quarter was played with a running clock.

Wiard was candid anyway, refusing to make excuses.

"Unfortunately," he said, "we offered very little resistance."

The only thing embarrassing about the defeat was that a CIF official tried to control the line of questioning afterward.

--Ben Bolch