By Oscar Prudencio
The Cooperative junior varsity girls basketball team defeated International in the International gym 32 to 21 Friday.
The game started with a nearly immediate score from the Jaguars. The entire Jaguar team seemed dead set on its goals, well balanced, and with a more aggressive and ferocious strategy. They made several more attempts, but the Griffins, always ready to provide surprises, fended off the Jaguar attempts and responded with a score of their own, top make the score 2-2.
The Griffenettes seemed to take a more defensive stance, spending more time at their end of the court attempting to block the Jaguars, and counter their every move. Both teams make equally good tries at scoring, but the SCCS girls were a lot more accurate with their shots and took a 10-2 lead at the end of the first quarter.
The scoring evened out in the second quarter, with each team scoring ten points, making the score at halftime 20-12 in favor of the Jaguars.
Throughout the second half, the Griffins tried to fight back. They shifted their defensive strategy and took a more aggressive stance. However, while it may have slowed the Jaguars at first, they adjusted and were able to widen their lead to 30-17 at the end of the third quarter.
The fourth quarter was quite surprising; the Griffins defended with excellent coordination and basically stopped the Jaguar offense, which didn’t score until the closing moments of the game when they got the final basket of the game. Meanwhile, the SCIS girls took the courage to attack the Jaguar basket with some success, scoring four points.
But the Jaguars were able to celebrate their 32 to 21 victory at the end. Both teams displayed great maturity as they shook hands and congratulated one another.
(Oscar Prudencio is a junior at International and managing editor of the website for that school.)
JV Eagles win big against Knights, 58-2
By Trevor Reed
The Christian Learning JV girls put on an impressive show against the Cambridge Knights, outscoring their opponents by 56 points before the final buzzer sounded.
By the end of the first half, the Eagles had a comfortable 12-0 lead, which they were able to widen to 30-0 by halftime. The Eagles dominated in rebounds as well as shooting, and their stifling defense stopped the Knights from scoring even a single basket. Emily Mercado gave the Eagles a height advantage, and good shooting by Rebeca Escudero helped to push the Eagles ahead.
In the third quarter, the Knights were finally able to score a basket, but the Eagles added eight baskets of their own, bringing the score to 46-2. The Knights appeared to be out of practice, especially on inbound passes. Multiple times, Escudero simply jumped up and caught the inbound pass, which left her completely open at the basket to score. By the end of the game, the score stood at 58-2, with the Eagles giving a strong impression of their skill and desire to win 1st place for the second year in a row.
(Trevor Reed is a senior at SCCLC and the editor-in-chief of the SCISL Blog.)
