Indians can’t make it work in summer league basketball game

BURROUGHS HIGH — For more than an hour Tuesday, Burroughs High girls’ basketball Coach Vicky Oganyan put her team through the paces dealing with how to break the press in anticipation of her squad’s summer league game later that afternoon against Alemany.

Under Coach Bryan Camacho — a former coach at Bellarmine-Jefferson who helped Alemany get to the CIF Southern Section Division III-AA championship and advance to the third round of the state playoffs last season — Alemany runs a stifling press that can rattle even the best of teams.

However, because of a scheduling snafu reportedly on the part of Alemany, the local Indians might have thought they caught a break as they instead took on Sherman Oaks Notre Dame in a Burroughs Summer League game.

But the Knights proved to be anything but pushovers, as the Indians suffered a 38-28 loss.

Burroughs was playing without key all-league standout Aysia Shellmire. According to Oganyan, the senior-to-be was benched because she played with her club team and missed a tournament with Burroughs last week.

Without their starting post player, the Indians couldn’t generate much offense and had trouble on the defensive end as well.

“I think a lot of our play was due to the girls being tired because we’ve been playing a lot of games,” Oganyan said. “That’s why I gave them the rest of the week off. You could just see that they were not at their best out there.”

Oganyan traditionally schedules a summer packed with league and tournament games. This summer is no exception. Along with summer league contests, the Indians have competed in competitive Saugus and Norco tournaments the last two weeks.

“When I made the Burroughs schedule I was looking for the toughest teams we can play,” Oganyan said. “That’s what’s going to make us better. I tell the girls that no one is going to remember your summer record. We need to get the experience against the best teams.”

Burroughs had a tough time containing Notre Dame’s Francis Lao (11 points), Jessica Fukushima (nine points) and Kat Wright (seven points, eight rebounds).

Burroughs jumped out to an early lead at the start of the first half. However, that lead was short-lived, as the Knights went ahead, 6-4, on a basket by Leo and did not trail thereafter.

The Knights didn’t let up, enjoying a 21-12 lead at halftime.

Oganyan said she was disappointed that the Indians were reluctant to shoot the ball, even when they had open looks at the basket.

“I told them you can’t score if you don’t take the shots,” she said. “They just have to learn to be more aggressive and take those shots when they have the opportunity. It’s hard for people who have never been scorers before to step up and become a scorer.”

Abbey Ibarra had seven points and Ashley Holmes added six for Burroughs.