Burroughs girls’ basketball neutralizes Glendale’s top scorer in league triumph
BURBANK — Stopping Jillian Yanai was the primary focus for the Burroughs High girls’ basketball team when it faced Glendale on Wednesday evening.
Yanai, a senior All-CIF Southern Section player, has scorched her share of Pacific League opponents this season. The Indians looked to take her out of the game and let the rest of the Nitros try to beat them.
The plan worked, as Yanai was held to four points. As a result, Burroughs never trailed throughout a 40-29 triumph against visiting Glendale.
“It was our mindset just to defend their best player, Jill, and not let her beat us,” said Burroughs coach Vicky Oganyan, whose team lost to Glendale, 30-29, on Jan. 10. “She’s really good and she can score some points. We just wanted to contain her and get out on their shooters.
“I though we did OK for the most part. We gave up some threes, but overall it was a good effort.”
The Nitros had problems containing Burroughs’ Marin Grote. The senior center had a game-high 15 points,15 rebounds and seven blocks. Freshman Dyani Del Castillo added 11 points and 10 rebounds and freshman Faith Boulanger chipped in with points and 11 rebounds.
With Yanai limited, Glendale received nine points from senior Lilia Vasghanian. However, no other Nitro scored more than five points.
“You have to give credit to the Burroughs defense because they did a great job at shutting down Jill today,” Glendale coach Tadeh Mardirosian said. “They sent two, three girls on her and that defense really did a good job.
“We needed the rest of our team to kind of chip in, but having three sophomores on the floor, it was tough for them to try and make up the slack.”
The Indians set the tone early, surging to a 6-0 lead in the first quarter. Burroughs increased its advantage to 12-2 on a three-pointer by Del Castillo with 2:36 left. The Nitros chipped away at the lead and trailed by five, 13-8, after one quarter.
Glendale missed its first six shots from the field to open the second quarter, allowing the Indians to build their lead to 10 once again, 18-8, at the 5:00 mark. Burroughs took a 10-point lead into halftime, 27-17.
“It was nice to be able to get out to early leads,” Grote said. “It’s not only reassuring, but we’ve also worked a lot on getting a strong start.
“Even though we lost that first game against them, we had a lot of missed shots in that game and we knew that we could play with them.”
In the third quarter, four early Glendale turnovers helped the Indians increase their advantage to 33-18 on a basket by Grote with 3:55 left. The third quarter ended with Burroughs ahead, 34-23.
In the fourth quarter, Glendale was only able to get the deficit down to nine, 38-29, with 3:28 remaining in the game.
Glendale (16-9, 8-3 in league) and Burroughs (17-8, 8-3) trail first-place Crescenta Valley (10-1 in league) by two games and Pasadena (19-7, 9-2) by one with three remaining.
Twitter: @jefftsports
