The Women’s basketball team took part in the Skyline Invitational Tournament from the 16th to 18th of November.
The Tournament opened on the 16th at 2 p.m, with the Monterey Peninsula College women’s basketball team playing against Shasta College, followed by Feather River vs Sequoia College, Cabrillo College vs the College of Redwoods, and finally at the end of the day was the Trojans first game of the tournament against the Allan Hancock College Bulldogs.
The Trojans opened their first game of the tournament with a strong showing against Allan Hancock College bulldogs successfully maintaining a strong defense to hold the lead however the bulldogs didn’t surrender. They slowly gained on the heels of the Trojans but they were never able to overcome their lead, ending the game at 55 points to Skyline 63 points.
While no teams were knocked out at the end of the first day that was to change on the 17th, as the first game of the day kicked off at 12 p.m. between Shasta College vs Feather Rivers which Shasta College won with a ten point lead leaving them at 68 to Feather River College 53 points. This effectively knocked them out of the tournament.
Cabrillo College against Allan Hancock College was next, despite putting up a strong fight throughout the game the Cabrillo Seahawks lost the match 51-64, effectively putting them out of the tournament.
The next game was with the Monterey Peninsula College vs Sequoias College which ended with Sequoias clearly dominating the game and ending the game 60 to Monterey 48 points. The Sequoias Lady Giants effectively ensuring their place in the finals for the tournament while the Monterey Lobo (Wolf’s) were left to fight for third place.
The last match of the night was the Skyline Trojans against the College of Redwoods Corsair. The match was hard fought but was tough to win in the end. The game started with Skyline in the lead but with only 12 minutes left in the first half, Corsair overtook the Trojans and successfully held of the Trojans attempt to regain the lead until the end of the first half.
In the second half the Trojans attempted to overtake the Corsairs, with points from Sophomore Stephanie Del Bianco, however the Corsairs were able to maintain their lead by scoring more points but it wasn’t enough to stop the Trojans from trying. They were constantly clipping away the heels of Redwood forcing them to score more point to maintain their lead.
At the end the Trojan just couldn’t close the gap, leaving Skyline seven points behind Redwoods. The final score was 79-86.
“Whenever we start games, we don’t necessarily think about the end result but think about how we’re going to get there. We think about team concepts, playing term defense, playing team offense, really working together to get to that final result and making sure that the end justify the means” Said Head Coach Chris Watters.
The loss put the College of Redwoods into the finals while the Trojans was set to face Monterey Peninsula College for third place.
The final day of the tournament saw three games been played. Sequoias College vs the College of Redwoods for first place and second place, Skyline College vs Monterey Peninsula College for second place, and Shasta College vs Allan Hancock College for the Consolation prize.
The first game of Nov. 18 was Shasta College vs Allan Hancock which ended with a hard tough game between the two that ended with Shasta College winning the Consolation prize, 56-44.
The second game of the day was the Trojans playing against Monterey Peninsula College. The game kicked off with the Lobo in the lead, leaving the Trojans with 12 points as the first half of the game ended. The second half of the game kicked off with the Trojans on the offense quickly closing the gap between them. They were unable to fully close the gap as the Lobo punched through their defense and scored points until with only less than ten minutes on the clock, Skyline was at 35 while the Lobo were at 47 points.
With five minutes left in the game, the Trojans and the Lobo found themselves on a tense situation that could go either way however at the end of the day it. Monterey Peninsula College was able to hold them off to win third place in the tournament with a final score of 56-43.
“I think we did a great job in competing today, we really worked hard, we got off to a slow start, (and) we really work hard to improve throughout the game. We played good defense and we didn’t quit the entire game and I think that’s just an indication of things to come” said Head Coach Chris Watters for the Women’s basketball team “Every game is a learning process for the coaches and the players. We know that we have to work on some things so it (the tournament) give us a good idea on what we need to work on, as well as what we did well and what we can rely on in the future.”
The final game of the tournament was played between Sequoias College and the College of Redwoods which once more ended with Sequoias dominating with a final score of 79-50.
