High School Male Athlete of the Week: Houston Mallette an emerging star for Pacifica Christian Orange County

Houston Mallette isn’t afraid to take the big shot for the Pacifica Christian Orange County boys’ basketball team.

The junior point guard has ice in his veins. There’s a reason that Tritons coach Jeff Berokoff describes Mallette’s confidence as “through the roof,” and at least part of that makes sense when Mallette’s past growing up in the east Bay Area is considered.

He spent time in his childhood hanging around the UC Berkeley men’s basketball team. Mallette’s father, Wesley, was the associate athletics director for strategic communications at Cal.

What that meant for Houston was that he got to meet players like Jaylen Brown, now with the Boston Celtics, and Ivan Rabb, who’s in the New York Knicks organization.

“They really cared after me and taught me a lot of things,” Houston Mallette said. “They mentored me, in a sense, when I was a little kid.”

Mallette entered high school at Salesian College Prep in Richmond in 2017-18 as a freshman on varsity. The Pride went 30-2 and won the CIF North Coast Section Division 3 title. Mallette continued to grow playing behind guys like James Akinjo, a then-senior point guard who went on to be the 2018-19 Big East Freshman of the Year for Georgetown University.

The family moved to Southern California prior to Houston’s sophomore year. Wesley was hired for a similar role as a senior associate athletics director at UC Riverside, while Houston enrolled at Pacifica Christian Orange County.

He said he was ready to step into the starting point guard duties as a sophomore.

“[My teammates at Salesian] really toughened me up and helped me become a complete point guard,” Mallette said. “I wasn’t nervous at all. I was actually very excited and ready to gel with my new teammates, my new brothers and just compete and try to win a state championship.”

The Bay Area’s loss has been the Tritons’ gain. Mallette, who earned All-CIF Southern Section Division 4AA honors last year after helping the Tritons reach the 4AA title game, has continued to grow as a basketball player. He has more than a dozen college offers and has taken recruiting trips to Penn State and Saint Mary’s College this year.

More importantly to Berokoff, Mallette is turning into a better and better team leader for Pacifica Christian (9-3), ranked No. 4 in Division 2A. He showed it last week at the Corona del Mar Beach Bash Tournament, helping the shorthanded Tritons reach the championship game.

Pacifica Christian went 3-1 in the tournament despite missing two starters. Saint Mary’s College-bound senior forward Judah Brown was out after suffering a concussion and back spasms when he was undercut attempting to dunk against Newport Christian on Dec. 3. Senior guard Timmy Bahadoor was also out with sickness.

Brown returned for the title game, a 90-38 loss to Mater Dei, the top-ranked team in Orange County that’s ranked No. 2 in Division 1. But it was the three games getting there in which Mallette, an all-tournament team selection, was able to shine.

He matched his season-high — and his jersey number — with 31 points in a tournament-opening 85-61 win over University. Mallette then scored 21 points in a 65-54 win over host CdM, and 19 points in a 61-56 semifinal win over a good Rancho Cucamonga Los Osos team that is tied for seventh in the Division 2AA rankings.

Mallette led Pacifica Christian with averages of 18.1 points, 4.3 rebounds and 1.9 steals per game through Thursday. He’s an emerging star on a Tritons squad which has goals of winning CIF and state titles after losing just one senior from last year’s team, Solomon Davis, to graduation. This year, Pacifica Christian has seven seniors, with Segerstrom transfer Charles Erving as a key addition who’s averaging 10 points per game.

“We’re just trying to go out there and win as many games as possible, go out and compete,” Mallette said, adding the team motto is “agape,” a Greco-Christian term referring to love. “We just have to all believe and climb the mountain together. Our goal is to win CIF, win state, and to love each other as we do, build relationships.”

Despite the senior leadership, it’s the junior Mallette is the one who often has the ball in his hands at key moments. That isn’t an accident. Last year, he banked in a three-pointer at the regulation buzzer to help the Tritons beat Bakersfield Christian 69-68 in overtime in the first round of the CIF State Southern California Regional Division III playoffs.

The clutch factor is just one reason why Berokoff, a first-team All-CIF player at Sonora High who went on to play at San Diego State and Cal Baptist, likes Mallette. He succeeds in the classroom as well, with a 4.0 grade-point average. And he tries his best to be a good role model for his three younger sisters.

“He’s a confident kid, and he’s been focused this year on making winning plays and helping the team win,” Berokoff said. “He’s always engaged, always focused. He’s always in it for the ‘we’ and not the ‘me,’ and that’s why everybody loves the kid. He really wants others to succeed, and that’s a really special thing.”

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Houston Mallette

Born: April 9, 2003

Hometown: Alameda

Height: 6 feet 5

Weight: 175 pounds

Sport: Basketball

Year: Junior

Coach: Jeff Berokoff

Favorite food: Sushi

Favorite movie: “The Pursuit of Happyness”

Favorite athletic moment: Making the All-CIF Southern Section Division 4AA team last year.

Week in review: Mallette helped Pacifica Christian Orange County go 3-1 at the Corona del Mar Beach Bash tournament, making the final before losing to Mater Dei. He was selected to the all-tournament team.

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