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Photo by
Juan Velez. Maleta Daughtery
celebrates with teammate Vanessa Faagata.
Cerritos advances to the second round of
the playoffs against Mt. San Antonio
College on Saturday night at 7 pm. |
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In the first three
minutes of their Southern California Regional
women's playoff game on Wednesday night, it looked
as though Cerritos College may put the game away
early on. But a resilient Santa Barbara City College
team continued to fight and eventually led by as
many as 11 points in the second half before the
Falcons made their move. The end result was a 72-71
win by 16th-seeded Cerritos (21-12) that sends the
team to the second round of the playoffs on Saturday
at 7:00 p.m. against three-time defending state
champion Mt. San Antonio College.
The second-half
comeback was culminated with 3.3 seconds remaining
when freshman guard
Maleta
Daughtery (Redondo HS)
converted the first of two free throws to put the
team up, 72-71. After missing the second shot,
freshman forward
Vannesa
Faagata (Paramount HS) came up
with the loose ball and ran out the clock. The win
over the #17-seeded Vaqueros (22-13) avenged a 72-58
loss earlier in the season.
Cerritos opened
the first half by jumping out to a 13-2 lead just
3:41 into the game, as freshman
Adria
Jackson (Lynwood HS) and
Daughtery drained consecutive three-pointers. But,
with 8:55 left in the first half, Santa Barbara City
tied the game at 24-24 after Imelda Bealer netted a
pair of free throws. The Vaqueros opened up a
seven-point lead at halftime (40-33) and even
extended that lead to 11 points (44-33) with 18:45
left in the second half. During that run by SBCC,
the Falcons went the final 6:30 of the first half
without scoring and needed another 1:37 of the
second half before sophomore forward
Mercedes
Taylor (Gahr HS) scored on a
layup.
The Vaqueros
out-rebounded Cerritos, 32-15 in the first half,
with 19 of those boards coming on the offensive end.
It was a different story in the second stanza, as
the Falcons limited SBCC to just five offensive
rebounds, although they were out-rebounded 63-44 on
the night.
The second half
rally stared with a baseline three-pointer by Taylor
(10 points, 10 rebounds, four steals), while a trey
by Jackson with 9:24 remaining got the team to
within 57-56. Cerritos took their first lead since
3:06 remaining in the first half when Jackson (15
points, four rebounds) converted two free throws.
The lead changed
hands several times, with the Falcons leading 67-64
with 3:14 remaining. A Janelle Wong three-pointer
gave Santa Barbara City a 69-67 lead with 2:05
remaining, but Cerritos limited their opponents to
just one more bucket the rest of the game. That
bucket was a baseline jumper by Katie Randall with
six seconds left that tied the game at 71-71. But as
the Falcons cross center court, Daughtery was fouled
by Jennifer Ju with 3.3 seconds left. She converted
the first for the eventual game-winning point.
Santa Barbara City
was led by Francesca DeAngelis, who led them with 21
points off the bench, while Josie Piercey (11
rebounds) and Nikki Graham (10 rebounds) controlled
the backboards. For Cerritos, Daughtery led the way
with 23 points, while Faagata accounted for 11
points off the bench and sophomore guard
Rachel
Butler (Calvary Chapel HS)
contributed seven points and eight rebounds.
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