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<\/p>\nIf she played for any other team in America besides her own, Tatianna Griffin would be receiving much more attention than she has but when you play alongside Kaleena Smith it is easy to get overlooked.<\/p>\n
Ontario Christian opened the season ranked No. 1 in the country and Griffin is one reason why. The 5-foot-11 forward was named 2024-25 MaxPreps national freshman of the year after helping the Knights go 30-2 and knock off Etiwanda 65-63 to win the Southern Section Open Division crown before losing to the Eagles 67-62 in the Open Division regional finals. Griffin had 29 points and 11 rebounds in the first game and added 16 points and 10 rebounds in the rematch last March.<\/p>\n
Griffin averaged 17.8 points, 8.2 rebounds, 3.9 assists and 2.8 steals and led her team in field-goal percentage (54.0) and three-point percentage (41.0) as a ninth-grader. She scored 551 points, dished out 122 assists, grabbed 255 rebounds, had 87 steals and blocked 22 shots. She was also durable, playing in 31 games, totaled double digits in points in all but one and scored 20 or more points 12 times.<\/p>\n
\u201cI started playing basketball when I was 4 years old,\u201d Griffin said. \u201cI grew up watching my dad play at the park. I was looking for a middle school and we were on the freeway and drove by Ontario Christian.\u201d<\/p>\n
The rest is history.<\/p>\n
It would be understandable to see a drop off in performance given the Knights\u2019 strength of schedule and the weight of expectations but head coach Aundre Cummings sees the opposite in his super sophomore.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Ontario Christian sophomore forward Tatianna Griffin powers her way to the basket during a win over Archbisop Mitty at the Kay Yow Showcase event at Mater Dei on Jan. 10.<\/p>\n
(Steve Galluzzo \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve not only seen growth in terms of her off-the-court leadership and accountability, but she\u2019s become more versatile too,\u201d Cummings said after the Knights overcame a 12-point deficit in the last four minutes of regulation to beat San Jose Archbishop Mitty 96-87 in double overtime Jan. 10 in the Kay Yow Showcase at Mater Dei. \u201cShe played 4 last season, now she\u2019s more of a 3 and her on-ball defending has improved greatly. She has a different mindset. She\u2019s learned to shoot through mistakes. Like today, she shot it 26 times. I told her, whether you make or miss, we need you to be aggressive. She\u2019s got that short-term memory that all great shooters have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Griffin finished with 20 points and 18 rebounds versus the top team in Northern California but her effort went mostly unnoticed as Smith had 50 points. Fortunately, Griffin has no ego \u2014 all that matters is winning.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe chipped away and eventually caught them,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen my shots aren\u2019t falling I get to the rim and look for rebounds. It\u2019s satisfying to get the win because last time we beat them without their best player [McKenna Woliczko] but this time she played. We pick our poison. \u2026 if Kaleena has the hot hand, we get it to her. Other games it\u2019ll be me or Dani [Robinson] or someone else.\u201d<\/p>\n
So far this season, Griffin is averaging 22.5 points, 8.2 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 1.1 blocks, 1.9 steals. Through 20 games she had racked up 447 points and 167 rebounds\u2014scoring 20 or more 14 times. She had 34 points and 18 rebounds against Lancaster on November 28.<\/p>\n
Smith, who is a consensus five-star recruit and the No. 1 high school prospect of the 2027 class, called her and Griffin \u201cthe best duo in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Griffin spent her summer in the gym and is bigger, stronger and faster.<\/p>\n
![\"Ontario](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768745243_42_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Ontario Christian High sophomore forward Tatianna Griffin pulls up for a jump shot over Archbishop Mitty\u2019s Tee McCarthy.<\/p>\n
(Steve Galluzzo \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
\u201cShooting for sure \u2014 my three-ball and pull-up jumpers,\u201d she said when asked what part of her game she worked on the most.<\/p>\n
Smith notices a difference too: \u201cI\u2019ve seen improvement in Tati\u2019s jump shot and I\u2019m very proud of her.\u201d<\/p>\n
Griffin attributes her chemistry with her older teammate to a genuine friendship years in the making.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur off-court bond is really special,\u201d she said. \u201cWe feed off each other and we\u2019ve helped one another through the tough times. We\u2019ve played together since I was 7 and she was 8 on the Rugrats.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ontario Christian suffered its first loss Friday night 57-55 to Forestville (Md.) Bishop McNamara (the No. 1 team in Maryland) at the Hoophall Classic in Springfield, Mass., but the Knights are focused on repeating as Southern Section champions and winning their first Open Division state title.<\/p>\n
Griffin has a bright future, but dreams of college or the WNBA are not distracting her from the here and now. She enjoys the process. It is an intense love of the game that drives her.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t live without basketball,\u201d she said. \u201cI want to be the best ever to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
She is well on her way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If she played for any other team in America besides her own, Tatianna Griffin would be receiving much…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":138959,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[6265,10450,35782,48,52,51,47,50,49,18158,70396,39731,1417,7556,278,5250,1573,11152,7590,70395,315],"class_list":["post-138958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-assist","tag-first-game","tag-knights","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-no","tag-ontario-christian-high","tag-other-team","tag-point","tag-rebound","tag-season","tag-shot","tag-smith","tag-steal","tag-strength","tag-tatianna-griffin","tag-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138958\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}