Hopes were high that the Culver City High School girls’ basketball team would win its second- CIF-Southern Section championship after upsetting top seed Orange Lutheran, 42-40, on Feb. 26 at Culver City.
The Lady Centaurs scored the first five points against No. 2 seed Murrieta Valley in the CIF-Southern Section Division IIA playoffs last Friday, Mar. 1, at the Anaheim Convention Center Arena. Unfortunately, their mostly underclass squad ran out of gas and fell to the Nighthawks, 49-37.
The Lady Centaurs (23-7) were in the game trailing, 31-27, after three quarters. In the final period, Culver City went cold, and Murrieta pulled away outscoring the Centaurs, 18-10.
“We’re a young team,” Culver City head coach Julian Anderson said. “We have just two players with varsity experience. We live to play hard. We’ll pull together next week (for the Southern California Regional playoffs).”
The Lady Centaurs got off to a good start, but the Nighthawks closed the first quarter outscoring the Centaurs, 11-2 for a four-point lead.
Murrieta led, 23-18, at halftime.
“We never got in rhythm,” Anderson said. “We needed to shoot better against the zone.”
Culver City was led by junior Kelsey Ueda with 14 points and 10 rebounds. Senior guard Taylor Tanita added 12 points, five rebounds and five assists.
Aliah Marshall led Murrieta with 14 points.
On Feb. 26, the Centaurs stunned top ranked Orange Lutheran behind a buzzer-beating winning basket by Tanita.
The Centaurs began the state playoffs March 6 at CIF-Los Angeles City Division II champion Granada Hills High School
NOT ENOUGH: Junior team captain Kelsey Ueda scores two of her game-high 14 points to go with 10 rebounds and senior Taylor Tanita added 12 points and 5 assists as the Lady Centaurs (23-7) lost to Murrieta Valley (25-4) in the CIF-SS 2A Finals 49-37. The Lady Centaur began playing in the state tournament on March 6.
Photo by George Laase