GIRLS’ BASKETBALL LA QUINTA CLASSIC : Esperanza Handles Ocean View

Marc Hill, having coached Esperanza to a 10-point victory over Ocean View once this season, put Friday’s La Quinta Classic championship game into perspective a few minutes before tipoff.

The way Hill figured it, the matchup boiled down to Esperanza’s depth against Ocean View’s two extremely talented players, Jennifer Tuiolosega and Becky Fraser.

Hill was right. Tuiolosega scored a game-high 28, and Fraser scored 21, but Esperanza had the more balanced scoring attack and defeated Ocean View, 71-63.

Esperanza (9-1), ranked No. 9 in The Times’ preseason poll, won a game in which it got 15 points from its bench players, and Ocean View (5-5) got 14 from everyone other than Tuiolosega or Fraser.

Fouls played a major role in the outcome. Ocean View was whistled for 25 fouls, and Esperanza called for 23. Ocean View’s Heather Hill had three fouls 6 1/2 minutes into the game, striking a blow to the Seahawks’ hopes of avenging a 78-68 loss to Esperanza in the third-place game of the Brea-Olinda Ladycat Classic a week ago.

“(Esperanza’s) so athletic and physical,” Ocean View Coach Ollie Martin said. “It’s hard to play some of your (bench) players against them because they just can’t match up physically against those kinds of athletes.

“Heather’s a physical, athletic player who can play with these players; when we lost Heather, we drop down in size and athleticism.”

Hill, 5 feet 9, sat out most of the second quarter and fouled out with 1:56 left in the third; she was replaced by Jodie Umehira (5-2) and Tracy Beelner (5-3).

Esperanza, meanwhile, took advantage of its depth.

Monique Toney scored 14, Leah Combs 13, Kim Hayashi 12 and tournament most valuable player Lindsay Foss had 17 points and eight rebounds.

Foss was especially valuable in the fourth quarter, making five of seven shots and scoring 10 points against a Seahawk team that cut a 12-point lead to four, 64-60, with 3 minutes 17 seconds left.

“I feel a lot more confident when I have the ball at the end of the game this year,” Foss said.

Said Marc Hill: “(Foss) wants the ball in pressure situations.”

The Aztecs also got seven points from Diane Severinsen and six from Theresa Gethins.

Esperanza held a 34-30 halftime lead and stretched it to 52-44 in the third quarter, helped by an eight-point quarter from Combs, a 6-foot freshman who finished with six rebounds.

In other tournament games:

Dana Hills 39, Troy 33--Erika Tillman had 10 points and Sara Herkenhoff had five points and a school-record 20 rebounds for Dana Hills (3-5) in the third-place game.

Santiago 42, La Quinta 26--Alejandra Torres had 16 points for Santiago in the seventh-place game. Santiago limited La Quinta to five points in the first half, taking a 20-5 lead.