La Jolla Country Day duo named to McDonald’s All-American girls basketball team

Breya Cunningham and Jada Williams from La Jolla Country Day School will help represent the West as McDonald’s All-Americans in girls basketball.

The nation’s top 48 players (four 12-player teams of boys and girls representing East and West) will play Tuesday, March 28, in Houston. The girls game will air at 3:30 p.m. PT on ESPN2 and the boys game will follow at 6 p.m. PT on ESPN.

“I’m so proud of the girls,” said Country Day girls coach Terri Bamford. “We’ve played a big schedule; the girls have been on the big stage and they’ve performed well.

“Breya and Jada are great players and great leaders.”

The 6-foot-4 Cunningham, a power forward, is averaging more than 19 points and 10 rebounds a game for the Torreys, who are ranked No. 6 in the nation by MaxPreps.com.

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The Torreys — ranked No. 6 in the country and No. 3 in California — have faced nine nationally ranked teams this season, and all but three of their first 25 opponents had winning records.

Williams, a point guard, is averaging about 11 points, four rebounds and five assists per game.

Just eight girls from the San Diego area have ever been named to the McDonald’s All-American team — five of them from La Jolla Country Day: Cunningham and Williams this year, Candice Wiggins (2004), Kelsey Plum (2013) and Te-hina Paopao (2020).

“We have a great tradition at Country Day,” Bamford said. “We have the girls’ jerseys hanging on the wall. It’s pretty impressive when someone comes into our gym and looks up.”

More than 720 players were nominated by a high school coach, an athletic director, a principal or a member of the McDonald’s All-American Games Selection Committee. The selection committee narrowed the list to the final 48.

— La Jolla Light staff contributed to this report. ◆