Burbank girls’ basketball owns second half, beats Glendale
Burbank’s Osanna Tirityan brings the ball up court against Glendale’s Claire Yanai in a Pacific League girls’ basketball game at Glendale on Monday.
A dominant second half of play turned what was a close Pacific League girls’ basketball game into an impressive victory for Burbank High.
The Bulldogs scored the first 14 points of the third quarter and never looked back to rout host Glendale, 52-32, on Monday.
Burbank, which finished fourth in league last season and a game behind Glendale, improved to 10-8, 2-1 in league, while the Nitros are now 11-7, 2-1.
“After letting [Glendale] back into the game in the second quarter, we came back in the second half and decided we weren’t going to let Glendale play with us and we took it to them,” Burbank Coach John Wells said. “I would say the takeaway from us today is we hadn’t had a game where we had 15 team assists and today we did. We played team ball.”
Bulldogs sophomore guard Osanna Tirityan led all scorers with 21 points, nine rebounds and two steals and helped her side create separation.
Burbank led, 21-20, at the half, and Tirityan added to that advantage with back-to-back three-pointers off assists from Sabrina Zakarian and Ani Sarkisyan to propel the Bulldogs ahead by seven points.
Burbank’s spurt grew into a 14-0 run that culminated on an offensive rebound and putback from senior forward Sarah Sarquiz (15 points and seven rebounds) with 2:14 left in the third to give Burbank a 35-20 advantage.
Glendale finally answered with its lone field goal of the third quarter — a runner from senior Claire Yanai — with 1:11 left to close the gap to 35-22 after three quarters, as Burbank decisively won the third, 14-2.
It was an overall disastrous third quarter for Glendale, which committed six of its 10 total turnovers during the frame, while shooting one for 15.
“This loss had to do with us not showing up to play,” Glendale Coach Tadeh Mardirosian said. “Burbank was ready to go, Burbank played their hearts out and Burbank got every 50-50 ball. Burbank out rebounded us and when we’re not playing defense or hustling for balls, then there’s no energy for offense.”
Matters did not improve much for Glendale in the fourth quarter, as the Bulldogs won that period as well, 17-10, to outscore Glendale, 31-12, in the second half.
Perhaps the key defensively to Burbank’s success was its emphasis on slowing down Glendale’s Sylvia Vartazarian.
The 5-foot-11 senior center kicked off Pacific League action with a dominant 21-point, seven-rebound effort in 52-44 win at Arcadia on Jan. 3.
Versus Burbank, Vartazarian was held to 10 points, three rebounds and one block.
“We as a team came up collectively with a game plan to stop Sylvia and then make others on the team beat us,” Wells said. “We did it. My girls frustrated the rest of the team and they played defense. This Burbank team plays defense.”
Glendale’s top scorer was Merina Latu, whose 12 points came in a rather impressive flourish.
Burbank closed out the first quarter with a 9-0 run to take a 12-4 lead on a three-pointer from Tirityan.
The lead ballooned to 21-8 on a jumper from Kaitlynn Hanno with 3:39 left in the second quarter as it appeared Burbank was ready to shut the door on Glendale.
The Nitros responded with four consecutive three-pointers from Latu, the final coming off an assist from Lilia Vasghanian with 44 seconds left that cemented the 21-20 Burbank advantage going into the half.
“I think this win really helps after we had a really hard [41-33] loss to [Crescenta Valley],” Tirityan said. “This is definitely going to help us bounce back because it doesn’t get easier. We have Pasadena and Arcadia coming up this week and Burroughs next week, so we needed this win.”
