Flintridge Prep girls’ basketball holds down Granite Hills

LA CAÑADA — As has been a hallmark of the success of the Flintridge Prep girls’ basketball team over the last five seasons, defense led the way in the team’s CIF Southern Section Division III-A playoff debut.

But it was an offensive surge in the form of a 13-point run that put an exclamation point on the second-seeded Rebels’ 55-32 victory over visiting Granite Hills in the second round on Saturday night at Flintridge Prep.

“I’m ecstatic about the defense,” said Flintridge Prep co-Coach Kevin Kiyomura, whose Prep League champions improved to 24-2, 10-0 at home and won their 16th consecutive game. “We’re gonna have nights when we don’t shoot the ball … and we knew the defense was going to have to carry us through.”

The defense, which allowed Granite Hills (14-9) to score in double-digits in just the third quarter, keyed the Rebels’ charge to a fifth consecutive trip to the quarterfinal round.

Fresh off winning a CIF Southern Section Division V-AA championship, Prep was moved up to III-A, but made its debut after a first-round bye and came away with splendid results.

Next up, the Rebels will host La Salle, which defeated Oxnard, on Wednesday night. Flintridge Prep defeated La Salle in its season opener.

“We know what we’re capable of and if we come out and play our game, I think we can play with anyone [in the division],” said Prep’s Renae Tamura, who had a game-high 21 points, including seven in a row during the Rebels’ 13-0 fourth-quarter run. “When we play as a team, we can compete with anybody.”

Taylor Yoshida added 15 points and five steals for the Rebels, while Kaitlyn Chen tallied nine points and eight rebounds and Natalie Benn chipped in four points and six rebounds.

Meanwhile, the Rebels’ defense stifled Granite Hills, which finished third in the Desert Sky League ahead of defeating Perris, 58-42, in the first round. The Cougars had just one double-digit scorer in Anyssia Gibbs, who totaled 15 points.

“I think we came out to a little bit of a rocky start. We had a little trouble rebounding early,” Tamura said. “I think we really focused on our key points like forcing them to take contested shots and forcing [Gibbs] to go to her left.”

Leading, 34-26, a minute into the fourth quarter, the Rebels salted the game away in emphatic fashion with a 13-0 run that saw Benn score on a beautiful pass from Chen with 6:30 left to begin the charge.

Fourteen seconds later, Chen converted a layup off her own steal and 19 seconds after that, Tamura converted another layin off a steal and coast-to-coast drive.

A timeout couldn’t slow the Rebels, as Tamura hit a jumper off the glass and followed with a three-pointer 12 seconds later. A Yoshida putback capped the run and the game for all intents and purposes.

Flintridge Prep began the game on a 7-0 run in the game’s first 69 seconds when Yoshida scored a layup off the opening tip, Tamura followed with another layin and Yoshida converted a three-point play.

But the Rebels went cold thereafter, hitting their first three shots of the game before missing their next 11. They also had to contend on the boards with a much taller team, but after losing the rebounding battle in the first stanza, 11-6, they won it overall, 26-25.

While Prep’s offense went cold after a hot start, fleeting as it was, the Rebels still held a 7-5 lead after the first period, as they didn’t allow the Cougars to score until just 3:03 was left in the quarter.

“I have confidence in our team,” Tamura said. “I knew we would pull it together.”

Granite Hills took an 11-7 lead in the second quarter, but Prep had another run in it, the biggest of the game, as the Rebels went on a 14-0 streak to take a 23-13 lead into the half.

The third quarter was an 11-11 stalemate that maintained the Rebels’ 10-point lead at 34-24 and set the stage for Prep to pull away.

“I thought this was just a great team win,” Kiyomura said. “Everybody was ready to step it up.”