Ladycats Show El Toro Their Supremacy

The best players on the court were apparent. So, too, was the best team.

In a game that showcased El Toro’s Giuliana Mendiola, the county’s leading scorer, and Brea Olinda’s Chelsea Trotter, last year’s Orange County player of the year, the outcome rested with others.

Second-ranked Brea, passing crisply, shooting well and hustling on defense, opened a 20-point lead on fourth-ranked El Toro and held on for a 71-60 nonleague victory Saturday at El Toro. It stopped El Toro’s nine-game winning streak.

Brea improved to 19-5; El Toro is 18-6.

The stars still did their thing. Mendiola, who will play at Washington next season, scored a game-high 36 points. Trotter, headed for Stanford, scored 30, grabbed 16 rebounds and had nine assists.

But the story revolved around lesser-known Ashley Saari, Jennifer Katsuyama, Daveri Bonnewitz and Robyn Phillips.

Phillips was starting in place of Jill Trader, who is out for the season after tearing her ACL in Thursday’s victory over Valencia. Phillips and the others rotated defensively on Mendiola, hounding her most of the night--especially in the first half--and then jumping back to cover the open shooter.

“They played great defense,” said Mendiola, who scored 29 of El Toro’s final 32 points. “That’s the toughest defense against me this year.”

It was almost an illusion. When Brea double-teamed Mendiola every time she got the ball, it left other players open. The Ladycats ran at the open player, and though they didn’t always arrive in time, seemed to get inside the Chargers’ heads.

“The key is to race at them,” Brea Coach Jeff Sink said. “They’ll never get there in time, but a lot of times, the shooters think they are.”

El Toro made only three of 17 shots in the first quarter, and five of 31 in the first half.

Brea, which made 28 of 62 field-goal attempts, led 18-8 after one quarter, opened an 18-point lead midway through the second quarter and limited Mendiola to eight first-half points.

The lead reached 20 points, 44-24, with 3 minutes 10 seconds left in the third quarter before El Toro launched a comeback, cutting the deficit to eight points with 1:30 remaining. Trotter scored Brea’s last eight points.

Tara Hefferly scored 13 and Jackie Lord nine for Brea. Sara Brown scored nine and Amy Shaw eight for El Toro.