Brea Olinda Left Befuddled by Inspired San Clemente

There’s something dangerous about facing a team that believes it has nothing to lose.

And by the time a miserable first quarter for the top-ranked Brea Olinda girls’ basketball team ended, host San Clemente had shown the Ladycats why.

The No. 4 Tritons held the Ladycats to only four first-quarter points and never trailed as they pulled away for a convincing 55-45 nonleague victory Saturday night.

Inspired from the start, the Tritons (13-2) went on an 11-2 run after the tip-off and never looked back. The closest Brea came to seeing the lead was at 2-2, no more than 20 seconds into the game.

“I think Brea always thought that they could make a run and come back, but they just ran out of time,” said Triton Coach Mary Mulligan. “They looked out of sync. The pressure was on them and they looked frustrated.”

The Ladycats appeared bewildered much of the game and never found a groove. They turned the ball over 12 times in the first quarter and looked rusty and sometimes hesitant. The Ladycats (8-5) hadn’t played since Dec. 21 in the Santa Barbara tournament.

Brea’s Chelsea Trotter, however, wasn’t ready to make excuses.

“I don’t know if the break meant that much,” she said. “We played like we deserved to lose. . . . I had no idea this [San Clemente] team was capable of this kind of intensity and heart.”

The Tritons, who like to run plenty of full-court traps and double-teams, laid off some and concentrated on shutting down Trotter and Jackie Lord. They did so, and without leaving any Ladycats open for easy shots.

After everything had gone San Clemente’s way, Brea seemed ready to storm back with 4 minutes 23 seconds left in the second quarter after Trotter hit a pair of free throws to cut the Triton lead to 17-16.

But the Tritons went on a 9-0 run to finish the half with an 11-point lead.

Whitney Jones converted a three-point play and Cassie Kruger found Kristin Jenkins for a layup to give the Tritons a 43-26 advantage late in the third quarter. A Trotter layup cut the lead to nine early in the fourth quarter, but a pair of baskets down the stretch by Kimberly Noble helped seal the victory.

“This kind of game was very frustrating,” said Brea Olinda Coach Jeff Sink, who said his team may be having problems getting up for the kind of opponents they see outside of the larger, high-profile tournaments. “It’s been a long time since we’ve faced this kind of adversity.”

It’s also been a long time since Brea Olinda has lost five games in a season. The last time was the 1986-87 season, in which the Ladycats finished 27-5. It was also Brea’s first loss to a county team since falling to Laguna Hills, 40-29, in the Division II regional championship game in 1997.

“Right now, we’re a talented team, but not a good team,” Sink said. “It’ll be an interesting developmental process to see if we can get back to playing Brea basketball.”

Noble finished with 15 points and 10 rebounds and Jones had 12 points and four steals for the Tritons.

Trotter led the Ladycats with 15 points, and Lord had 12.