Prep triples up on Tigers

SOUTH PASADENA — By the end of the 2010-11 season, it was no secret what the Flintridge Prep girls’ basketball team’s main strength was — three-point shooting.

While they sometimes live and die by the three, when the shots are falling, the Rebels can make a pretty rich living. That was once again the case during Monday afternoon’s South Pasadena High Summer League game against Prep League rival Westridge, in which Prep buried 10 three-pointers en route to a 40-23 win.

Nearly all of the Rebels’ scoring came from two players, sophomore-to-be point guard Maya Okamoto, who sank four three-balls in the first half, and junior-to-be forward Katherine Bogaard, who finished off the Tigers with five threes in the second half.

“I’m just glad I got into it and I got a groove,” said Bogaard, who finished with 18 points, six rebounds and three steals. “I really wanted to beat them.”

Thanks to an 18-8 first-half rebounding advantage, including 12 caroms on the offensive end, Westridge took twice as many shot attempts as Prep, but struggled to convert even on its second and third attempts from the field.

Okamoto, on the other hand, came out on fire, hitting her first four shots from the field, all three-pointers. Okamoto, who finished with a game-high 20 points and seven assists, would score the Rebels’ first 18 points of the game before Bogaard connected on a three-pointer at the first-half buzzer for a 21-12 lead.

Bogaard took over in the second half, beginning with a three-pointer three minutes in that pushed the lead to 24-12.

“That’s our team, and we kind of discovered that during league last year,” Rebels Coach Todd Frost said. “We’re a really good three-point shooting team. …We can be a tough team to stop because we can drain it from three or four spots on the floor.

“I think with Maya getting us going early, they were so focused on stopping her that it really just opened up Katherine.”

Westridge cut the lead back to eight before Prep surged back with an 8-2 run on a putback on a fast break by Okamoto and consecutive three-pointers from the right side by Bogaard for a 32-18 lead at the 7:15 mark.

Bogaard would burn the Tigers twice more from the exact same spot, fueling a 6-0 run to put the game away after the Tigers had scored five straight to pull back within nine.

“I think I finally just realized where they were leaving the openings and I just got there and kept getting open,” Bogaard said. “They kept crashing into [Okamoto] and I kept getting open in the corner and kept shooting.”