3-A Girls : Blackburn’s Play Gets Brea-Olinda Past St. Joseph

Early in a 65-58 victory over St. Joseph High School of Lakewood Saturday in the 3-A semifinals, the Brea-Olinda girls’ basketball team fell behind when star guard Aimee McDaniel fell into a shooting slump.

Did coach Mark Trakh worry?

“No,” Trakh said. “I knew the kids were going to win. They know how to win.”

It took an 8-1 run in the closing minutes and some clutch play by junior forward Tammy Blackburn, but top-seeded Brea-Olinda made a close game look easy, setting up a showdown in the finals on Friday against Atascadero.

“I knew it was going to be close,” Trakh said. “They didn’t read any stuff (in the newspaper) about us winning by 30 points. There is this misconception that we have an overabundance of talent. The players came expecting a close game.”

And that’s what they got, as the teams traded leads throughout the game until Brea-Olinda, behind Blackburn’s six points and five rebounds, took control in the final 3 minutes.

“I was worried, really worried,” Blackburn said. “But I knew we had heart and we would be in it.

“All that hard work and those close games paid off. I knew as soon as we jumped out in the second half, we had it.”

Brea-Olinda (26-2) fell behind, 16-11, in the first quarter as Lisa Fernandez scored eight of her game-high 24 points.

At the same time, McDaniel was mired in a 1-for-9 slump, misfiring short jumpers and even throwing up an air ball.

“I was worried,” McDaniel said. “I wasn’t hitting my shots. But I knew we’d come back. I wasn’t going to let this slip by.”

McDaniel did come back, hitting two three-pointers in the second quarter en route to a team-high 18 points.

Late in the fourth quarter, McDaniel hit a five-foot jumper to open up a four-point lead, 61-57, and later hit both ends of a one-and-one to close out the scoring.

St. Joseph finished at 21-7.