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Orange Lutheran players and coaches celebrate after the Lancers won the CIF title Saturday.(Photos: Fernando M. Donado, For OC Sports Zone).
Orange Lutheran High School’s girls basketball team celebrated another first Saturday afternoon.
The Lancers defeated Marlborough 63-45 at Honda Center to capture their first CIF Division 1 crown and seventh overall. Orange Lutheran won the 2AA crown last year.
To see the slide show, click on the first photo:
“That was such a great game on both ends,” said Orange Lutheran acting coach Alex Helmage, who filled in for head coach Lindsay Charity after Charity went on maternity leave. “Kudos to Marlborough for making it this far, a senior-led team who didn’t want to lose and was well coached and had some tremendous seniors on their team.
“Going into this playoff run, our girls just locked in. They just followed the game plan on whoever we were going to play. We weren’t looking past any opponent. If you guys noticed, we don’t really have superstars on our team. It takes all 10 of us on our team to honestly beat us and as a collective team, I’m so proud of these girls.”
Junior Shea Joko scored 17 points and made 4 of 8 three-pointers to lead a balanced offensive attack for Orange Lutheran. Juniors Princess Cassell and Sheridan Kennedy had 10 points each and senior Madison Bogan and sophomore Kelly Garrity nine points each to lead Orange Lutheran.
Marlborough (22-10) was led by Lauren Munoz and Jacqueline Diaz, who had 12 points each.
The teams were tied 17-17 after one quarter. Orange Lutheran (25-7) held a 30-25 lead at halftime and then took charge outscoring Marlborough 15-9 in the third quarter.
“We wanted to keep the momentum and continue to do what we do,” Helmage said. “There were little tweeks here and there that we had to adjust defensively, but offensively, it was more attack, attack, attack. Playing in a big arena like this, it’s difficult to shoot on the outside a little so if our outside shots aren’t falling in, let’s go on the inside.”
Orange Lutheran players were excited to bring home another title.
“I think it’s a breakthrough moment,” said Joko. “I think it’s really cool for our program that we got as far, we made history for Orange Lutheran and going back to back, winning it last year. I think it’s really cool for our program, especially where we started my freshman year.”
“Coming in my freshman year, we lost first round and it’s always been our goal to be better than last season and I feel especially going D-1, a lot people doubted us and our team but we knew just to stick together, and it means a lot because it shows how far we’ve come,” added Cassell, who also had nine rebounds.
Orange Lutheran made 39 percent of its field goal attempts while Marlborough made 29 percent. Orange Lutheran had the rebound edge 42-32.
Charity, who celebrated the birth of her daughter Brooklynn on Jan. 31, did not coach in the game but she was on the bench.
“I’m so stoked for our girls, they deserve it,” Charity said in an interview. “They’ve put in so much work in the off-season to all get better as individuals. It just really paid off here. Everyone bought in, there was a seemless transition from when I stepped out to Alex stepping in. Everyone bought in and was on the same page and put the work in and they deserve that win.”
—Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com
