Foul trouble doesn’t stop La Cañada girls’ basketball from winning title
In an unexpected battle of attrition, the La Cañada High girls’ basketball team was forced to deal with two pesky issues in Thursday afternoon’s championship game of the 10th annual La Cañada New Year’s Ball Tournament.
If surging Thousand Oaks wasn’t a difficult enough hurdle, the Spartans also had to deal with foul trouble that ceded a clear victory at the free-throw line for the visiting Lancers.
Despite those issues, La Cañada closed out late and won its second straight tournament championship after a 51-41 victory.
For a second consecutive season, senior Zoe Williams was named most valuable player after leading the Spartans (10-4) with 16 points and 10 rebounds. The Spartans’ Kristina Kurdoghlian (six points and four rebounds) and Tessa Oakley-Stilson (eight points and three steals) were named all-tournament selections.
“The takeaway from today was our ability to grind it out and to stay in the game even when things got tough in the second quarter,” La Cañada Coach Sarah Beattie said. “We couldn’t play any starters the entire second quarter, so we really depend on our second unit and on our defensive effort.”
The Spartans saw their seven-point fourth-quarter advantage whittled away to 41-39 with 3:59 left after a three-pointer from Lizzy Benton, who was named to the all-tournament team after finishing with a game-high 18 points and seven rebounds.
As the contest tightened, the Spartans countered with a three-pointer from Brooke Yasuda (five points).
The Spartans’ inside-outside game was on full display as Williams, the team’s 6-foot-1 center, scored on an offensive putback on the next offensive series, while she added two free throws the following time down to put La Cañada up, 48-39, with 2:14 left.
Though the Lancers added two points on free throws from Diana Suarez (11 points) and Ranika Guyton to pull within 48-41, they never inched any closer.
“For us, we need to move the ball around and keep the offense going,” Oakley-Stilson said. “When we weren’t scoring, we were taking bad shots and committing fouls. Once we stopped doing that, we took control.”
La Cañada was called for 22 fouls, while Oakley-Stilson fouled out and four other players were saddled with three or more infractions. On the flip side, Thousand Oaks (8-9) was called for 13 fouls and didn’t have a player in serious foul trouble.
Those numbers translated into a 32-14 deficit in free throws attempted for the Spartans.
The fouls caught up to the Spartans in a sloppy and sluggish second quarter.
La Cañada entered the quarter leading, 16-8, but reached the double bonus with 5:30 left in the second period. A minute later, each starter had picked up two fouls and was forced to sit.
That allowed Thousand Oaks to rally and take a 23-21 lead into halftime thanks in part to 11 points from the charity stripe.
The Lancers outscored the Spartans, 15-5, in the second quarter despite making only two field goals, with the second coming on a runner from all-tournament selection Kelli White before the half.
“I feel like we should have moved our feet better on defense and communicated more on the press break,” Kurdoghlian said. “The game was tightly called, but we could have done better to limit fouls.”
La Cañada responded in the second half with an 8-2 run capped on an inside bucket from Alexi Nazarian with 3:48 remaining in the third quarter to give the home team a 29-25 lead.
Only seconds before, Williams picked up her fourth foul and was taken out.
Her absence helped Thousand Oaks rally again and take a 32-31 advantage after three quarters.
“I was a [little worried] when I got that fourth foul, but I’ve been there before,” Williams said. “Sarah was mad and her reaction was understandable because I was mad, too, but I knew I could count on my team.”
La Cañada responded again in the fourth with a 10-2 run to take a 41-34 lead after two free throws from Oakley-Stilson with 5:24 left. The Spartans never trailed again.
