The Cate girls basketball team was grace under fire on Friday evening in a 33-30 overtime Condor League victory at Laguna Blanca.
Named for the part, Grace Williams and Maddie Firestone led the way for the Rams, both recording double-doubles to help keep Cate undefeated in league play while sending the rival Owls to their first league loss.
“We like to keep our fans entertained,” joked Cate’s Vanessa Vilsaint, referring to the team’s past two games – both nailbiters.
“These kids have developed over the last two or three games a sense of confidence that they didn’t have before,” said head coach Tere Linzey. “So now when things get tight, they know that they can push through it and come out on the other side a winner.”
It almost wasn’t so, as the Owls held a five point lead with five minutes left in the game. A Firestone layup with 37 seconds on the clock capped a 7-1 Cate run that put the Rams up 26-25.
Laguna had the ball in the final seconds of regulation and Cate fouled Laguna’s Kendall Hall taking a jump shot with 2.7 seconds remaining.
Hall knocked down 1-of-2 to send it to overtime.
Cate, having been there before, scored the first six points in the extra period to put the game out of reach.
The Rams improve to 8-3, 3-0 in league and the Owls are now 7-4 and 1-1.
Cate benefited from Laguna’s poor shooting night as the Owls went only 11-of-54 from the field.
“The difference in the game was our poor shooting, so it wasn’t anything they did that surprised us,” said Owls coach Ernie Quiroz. “We scouted them, did the things we were supposed to do, played great defense – we just didn’t shoot well.”
Amanda Schulenberg led the Owls with nine points and Hall had eight.
CATE 33, LAGUNA BLANCA 30, OT
CATE – Williams 11, Firestone 10, Zak 6, Vilsaint 6.
LAGUNA BLANCA – Kent 4, Hall 8, Schulenberg 9, McAlister 3, O’Connor 3, Farrise 3.
Cate 4 9 4 9 7 – 33
Laguna Blanca 1 7 11 7 4 – 30
