Pirates knocked down

Bryce Alderton

Any high the Orange Coast College women’s basketball team might have

felt after a thrilling double-overtime road victory over Saddleback

last week quickly evaporated Wednesday night in Peterson Gym on the

OCC campus.

Visiting Irvine Valley used a staunch defense to get back into the

Orange Empire Conference race with a convincing 62-50 victory over

OCC.

Sophomore forward April Robles led all scorers with 22 points

while guard Meghan McGovern tallied 12 for the Lasers (11-5, 2-3 in

conference), who used a 20-8 run the final nine minutes, 27 seconds

to pull away after a Jessica Chades three-pointer in the corner tied

the score at 42.

Sophomore Alisa Carrillo scored a team-high 16 points on 6-of-11

shooting while Amy Shaw scored nine points and Rhondi Naff added

eight for Coast (10-9, 3-2), which has lost four of its last six

games at home.

OCC entered Wednesday’s game tied with Fullerton and Cypress for

the conference lead at 3-1.

“We played with no emotion or passion tonight,” OCC Coach Mike

Thornton said. “[The Lasers] had their backs to the wall and that is

what we told our players. If [the Lasers] went to 1-4, they would

have been in trouble. It’s disappointing. We didn’t play hard and

didn’t respond well to pressure.”

IVC Coach Julie Hanks concurred with the game’s importance in the

conference race.

The Lasers were coming off a 65-61 loss to Fullerton on Friday.

“That was devastating because we lost it in the last minute,”

Hanks said. “We had to win to stay in the hunt.”

There were no last-minute heroics Wednesday, just a sound

defensive scheme that made it difficult for Coast guards to make

entry passes into the post. The Lasers held Carrillo to her average

(16.1 points).

“We fronted the whole game and [Carrillo] got her points, but we

put pressure on the guards to make it hard to throw the ball in,”

Hanks said.

“[Robles] did a great job on Alisa,” Thornton said. “At the same

time, Alisa has to keep moving and get second-chance scoring

opportunities and find other ways to score.”

IVC outrebounded OCC, 32-28. Monica Silivelio, a 5-foot-6 guard,

grabbed a team-leading eight rebounds -- four offensive -- for IVC

while Carrillo led Coast with eight.

The Lasers led, 26-21, at halftime after completing a 7-0 run the

final 4:58 before intermission. A three-pointer by Jessica Chades

(six points) gave Coast its last lead at 21-19 before the

aforementioned 7-0 run in which OCC committed three turnovers and

missed five shots.

The Pirates battled their way back in the second half, tying the

Lasers again at 44 on two free throws by Naff with 6:22 remaining.

But the Lasers responded after a timeout and hit two quick threes

to take a six-point lead and the Pirates never recovered.

OCC went 13 of 13 from the free-throw line, but finished just 16

of 50 from the field (32%), including going 8 of 28 in the first half

(28.6%).

Chades and Biava Arganda each had four assists.

Coast defeated host Saddleback, 82-78, Friday, but Thornton was

reminded again of the apparent parity in the conference.

“All eight teams can beat each other,” he said. “In this game, if

you think it is going good, it will bite you in the butt.”