ST. HELENA — The rivalry may not be what it was when she starred for Kelseyville High School, but first-year varsity girls” basketball coach Caitlin Andrus still enjoyed watching her Knights beat the Clear Lake Cardinals 41-22 on Friday night in the winner”s semifinals of the St. Helena Tournament.
It was the third straight win for the Knights, who play either St. Helena or John Swett for the championship tonight.
“I tried to pump them up at halftime and get them to come out strong in the second half, and they did,” Andrus said.
The Knights (3-3) led only 15-12 at the intermission but dominated the second half.
“It wasn”t any one player, it was strong team play,” Andrus said. “We had good communication out there and our fundamentals were solid.”
Jodi Snider”s 14 points powered Kelseyville. Amanda Mueller added six points and a team-high 10 rebounds, while Ashley Mueller had seven points and seven rebounds.
Sunny McFall”s 15 points paced the Cardinals (3-4), whose next highest scorer had only three points.
In other girls” basketball action Friday:
Hayfork 68, Lower Lake 61 (OT)
At Durham, Hayfork banked in a 3-pointer with 1.2 seconds left in regulation and went on to beat the Lower Lake Trojans in the consolation round of the Durham Tournament.
Lower Lake (3-3) plays River Valley in the seventh-place game today at 10 a.m.
“We had the game in our hands,” Lower Lake coach Andrew Carpenter said.
Lower Lake led 30-20 at the half, but Hayfork surged ahead with a 17-0 run to open the third quarter. The Trojans scored only eight points in the period, all from reserves, but battled back to take the lead late in the fourth quarter.
“We couldn”t hit the broadside of a barn in the third quarter,” Carpenter said.
In the overtime period, Lower Lake”s Amber Shoffeitt scored the first two points after the tip-off, but Hayfork came back to take the lead and win the game.
Shoffeitt, Lower Lake”s leading scorer with 17 points, had five of the Trojans” six points in the overtime period.
Danielle Bettencourt had 11 points for Lower Lake and Rissy Prude finished with nine.
Hayford hit 26 of its 30 free throws compared to Lower Lake”s 10 of 22.
