Basketball Game Preview: Channel Islands Raiders vs. Santa Paula Cardinals

Channel Islands is 2-7 against Santa Paula since December of 2014 but they'll have a chance to close the gap a little bit on Friday. The Channel Islands Raiders will face off against the Santa Paula Cardinals at 7:00 p.m. Keep an eye on the score for this one: both posted some lofty point totals in their previous games.

Santa Paula is hoping to do what Nordhoff couldn't on Wednesday: put an end to Channel Islands' winning streak, which now stands at four games. Channel Islands took down Nordhoff 69-54. Given the Raiders' advantage in MaxPreps' California basketball rankings (they are ranked 386th, while the Rangers are ranked 1129th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.

Meanwhile, even if it wasn't a dominant performance, Santa Paula beat Carpinteria 72-66 on Wednesday. The win made it back-to-back victories for the Cardinals.

Santa Paula is on a roll lately: they've won seven of their last nine games, which provided a nice bump to their 11-6 record this season. The wins came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 75.1 points per game. As for Channel Islands, their victory was their fourth straight at home, which pushed their record up to 14-3.

Channel Islands suffered a grim 72-46 defeat to Santa Paula in their previous meeting back in January of 2024. Can Channel Islands avenge their defeat or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.