By Noe Ortega
Women’s basketball will move on to the third round of the Southern California Regional playoffs after a comeback against Cypress College 55-52 at home on Saturday.
East Los Angeles College was down by 14 points in the third quarter, and had its worst performance in a single quarter with only five points scored.
ELAC came back to score 23 points in the fourth quarter and limited Cypress to six points to win its 26 match of the regular season and playoffs.
Head coach Bruce Turner said that during the halftime he spoke to his team and told them that they were going to win the game.
Turner said he didn’t know how they were going to win or who was going to win it for them, but that their season wasn’t going to end that night.
Freshman guard Adriana Gonzalez came off the bench and scored six points and got four rebounds.
Freshman forward Jadis Watson scored three points in the fourth quarter and got two rebounds. Watson finished with 13 rebounds ,and Gonzalez finished with seven.
The Huskies started to run into the paint and score layups, but were still down by nine points.
Cypress couldn’t contain the constant full-court press from the Huskies in the fourth quarter and it resulted in six turnovers where ELAC capitalized.
“ (Our) defense full court pressing was one thing that really kept us in the game,” Jennifer Pool, sophomore guard, said.
Freshman guard Citlaly Davalos and sophomore guard Jaelynn Curley made the gymnasium erupt by scoring back-to-back three point shots to cut deficit to one point.
The Huskies made six three point shots out of 30 attempts, and four of them came in the fourth quarter.
“We were forcing the threes, short arming, rushing threes instead of mixing it up. Taking what the defense was giving us. But our pressure defense was the key in the fourth (quarter),” Turner said.
ELAC was able to turn to its bench. The Huskies outscored Cypress bench 23-13.
Both benches finished with 20 rebounds.
The Huskies scored well below their season average of 77.4 points per game from behind the three point line and field goals made, with 20 percent from the three point line and 29.2 percent made in field goals.
While their season average was 42 percent in field goals and 34.5 percent from behind the three point line.
Turner said that despite not having the best night in shooting, his team never gave up and fought hard until the game ended.
Cypress and ELAC were both even throughout the first two quarters and the Huskies went into halftime down by five points.
ELAC came into the third quarter and made two field goals and one free throw. The Huskies attempted five three point shots, but didn’t make any. While Cypress made seven out of 16 field goal attempts.
“He (Turner) just kept saying that the game is not over. We just have to keep trying. Time isn’t an issue, and we just had to play basketball like we always do,” Pool said.
The Huskies look to reach the SoCal Regional final as they host Pasadena City College on Saturday at 7 p.m.