Morningside Girls Win Round 3 From Palos Verdes, 56-50

It took three tries, but Morning side High girls’ basketball Coach Ron Randle said he finally got his point across.

Only two defeats blemish the Monarchs’ otherwise impressive record--both courtesy of Palos Verdes, the CIF’s Division III top-ranked team. On Wednesday night, Randle and his club got revenge.

Using a balanced attack and a hard-charging defense that forced 24 turnovers, the host Monarchs defeated the Sea Kings, 56-50.

Morningside improved to 22-2 overall and is tied with Palos Verdes for the Ocean League lead at 5-1. The Sea Kings, who saw their 52-game league winning streak end, are 21-2 and 5-1.

“We can beat them on any given night if we come out and play our game,” Randle said. “Tonight we did that. We were able to establish our game, which is transition, and they couldn’t stay with us. I think we redeemed ourselves to a certain extent tonight.”

The Monarchs seemingly put the game away with a 14-2 run that gave them a 43-33 lead with 5:41 remaining. But Palos Verdes pulled back into contention by scoring the next nine points.

Morningside regained momentum and hit seven of eight free throws in the last 1:14.

The Monarchs opened with a full-court press that frustrated Palos Verdes. The Sea Kings shot only 28% from the field.

“Morningside is an excellent team,” Palos Verdes Coach Wendell Yoshida said. “They have good athletes and are very well coached. You can’t make as many mistakes as we did against a team like that.

“But they also had a few things going for them: They didn’t want to get swept, they were playing on their home court and they wanted a piece of the league championship.”

Morningside junior center Janet Davis had 13 points and seven rebounds and play-making guard Akiba Flanagan added 12. Princess Murray had 11, including five-of-six shooting from the free-throw line.

Freshman guard Mimi McKinney had 14 and Kristen Mulligan and Jeffra Gausepohl contributed 10 apiece for Palos Verdes.

The Sea Kings had a 42-25 rebounding edge, with Gausepohl grabbing 13.

Randle said the Monarchs were motivated by the two losses to the Sea Kings.

“It was a major factor in how intense we came out to start the game,” Randle said. “But this is a team that’s used to winning and will accept nothing else but winning. We were not going to lose to a team three times.”