Faith Christian wins CIF State D-IV title to cap career of star Lauren Harris
After capturing three CIF Sac-Joaquin Section championships and a Northern California crown over the past four years, Faith Christian of Yuba City earned its first-ever CIF State championship on Saturday at Golden 1 Center.
Star senior Lauren Harris cemented herself as one of the Sacramento area’s all-time greats, leading the Lions with 26 points, 16 rebounds, five assists, three blocks and two steals in a 51-37 victory in the Division IV championship game against Palisades of the Los Angeles City Section.
“I never thought I’d be with this team right here, right now, having this trophy right here,” Harris said. “I couldn’t have done it without anyone, all these people here, my coaches, my family.”
Harris set the national career record for 3-pointers over a four-year high school career earlier this season and finished with three triples to complete her illustrious resume with 742. The 5-foot-11 guard is headed to Long Beach State on scholarship.
“An amazing career,” said Faith Christian head coach Geoff Harris, Lauren’s father. “Lauren’s been under so much pressure for many, many years in a row. She was thrown in a pretty big position when she was young, and for the last three to four years has just handled everything that’s been thrown on her shoulders, and she did it because she knew she’d have to carry a heavy load. And she made sure to work hard to be able to do that. She doesn’t want to let her teammates down.”
It was a year of milestones for each of Faith Christian’s big three. Harris surpassed 3,000 career points, senior forward Presley Berry went over 2,000, and with three first-quarter points, junior guard Mia Bryan eclipsed 1,000 career points.
That’s a remarkable feat for a school of 52 students.
“(Lauren and Presley) are always my inspiration,” Bryan said. “Seeing their posters up there every day — 2,000, 3,000 — we were just missing 1,000. We’re the big three, and we just completed it, so I’m very grateful.”
Berry finished with 18 points and three rebounds while Bryan added seven points and three steals. Unsung starters Hannah Hessong and Mandy Fitzgerald made several contributions that don’t always get recognized in the box score.
“Defensively, this (Palisades) team was really tough to cover,” Geoff Harris said. “Hannah and Mandy being able to cover as much on the inside, the outside, rotate around defensively, Mandy played a spot in our zone that she’s never played all year, had an adjustment at halftime and just filled it up.”
Trailing 11-10 in the closing seconds of the first quarter, Harris heaved a shot from the opposite 3-point line for a three-quarter court buzzer beater to give the Lions a 13-11 lead. The Dolphins hung tight with Faith by the end of the first half with a 29-26 score.
Faith allowed just 11 points in the second half as the team cruised to a 14-point victory, finishing the 2025–26 season at 34-1.
Faith is further proof that David can slay Goliath. With an enrollment of nearly 2,900 students, Palisades is by far the largest school that Faith Christian has ever played. So how did this showdown come about? The CIF several years ago implemented a “competitive-equity” model for the playoffs, dropping teams into brackets per an overall ranking system regardless of enrollment. Faith Christian showed that it belonged and backed it up.
“It’s like an anomaly that we started in D-VI and we rose all the way to D-IV and won,” Bryan said. “It’s a pretty big accomplishment. Obviously, I’m really proud of us for holding our own in such a high division.”
Palisades reached title game through adversity
The Dolphins (16-14) endured tremendous trials over the past 15 months. The Southern California wildfires of January 2025 badly damaged the campus at Palisades High School, forcing the school to temporarily close. The team has been practicing in several interim facilities in the meantime en route to the program’s first state title game appearance since 1999.
“It’s been surreal,” Palisades head coach and 2010 school alum Lebre Merritt said. “This group didn’t make any excuses ... That’s pretty much just been our identity, a group that’s not going to make excuses, a group that’s going to play hard, play smart and play together.”
Several players from the Palisades program were displaced due to the fires, including senior Ayla Teegardin, who finished Saturday with 3 points and six rebounds.
“My house had burned down,” Teegardin said. “I was displaced in a hotel for three months while our whole season went on. I struggled with a lot of anxiety coming into the games, but it was also the only thing that kept my life stable and real.”
This story was originally published March 14, 2026 at 1:37 PM.