OIA Girls Basketball
Fast start propels Kaiser past visiting Leilehua, 47-34


Wes Nakama
January 20, 2012, 7:57pm

  

Fri, Jan 20, 2012 @ Kaiser

Leilehua

34

Kaiser

47

Final 1 2 3 4  
Leilehua (9-4, 9-4) 6 119834
Kaiser (10-1, 13-5) 9 18 8 1247
Micaela Bitanga 15 pts  1 3pm
Mariah Ross 11 pts


Kaiser jumped out to a 9-0 lead in the first five minutes and then held off visiting Leilehua, 47-34, tonight in O'ahu Interscholastic Association girls basketball action.

The victory advances the Eastern Division runner-up Cougars (11-1) to Tuesday's quarterfinal matchup against East No. 4 seed Roosevelt, which upset West champ Mililani. Tuesday's game is set for 6 p.m.

Leilehua (9-3) falls into a 6 p.m. losers bracket game Tuesday at Mililani.

Kaiser's 9-0 start was begun by Chandler Arce's layup 22 second into the game and capped by Micaela Bitanga's 3-pointer with 3:43 remaining in the first period. Carissa McBride finally got the Mules on the scoreboard with a putback one minute later, then added a layup and putback to close it to 9-6 at the end of the quarter.

The Cougars then began the second period with a 6-0 run capped Darcy Goulsby's free throw to make it 15-6, and later went on an 8-2 run to push the lead to 27-15 after Kellie Sakai's 3-pointer 27 seconds before halftime. Mariah Ross' two free throws 15 seconds later made it 27-17 at the break.

"They came out with a full-court press, and we had problems with that," Leilehua coach Elroy Dumlao said. "They played aggressive and we played tentative, and we weren't matching up with their speed. We were trying to run with them, but we'd make turnovers. They played with better speed than us."

Kaiser opened the second half with a 6-0 run to make it 32-17 on Bitanga's free throw with 5:44 left in the third period, but the Mules chipped away and closed it to 37-31 on a baseline jumper by Ross two minutes into the fourth.

Arce then drained a 3-pointer to ignite an 8-0 run that made it 45-31 after Bitanga's two free throws with 50 seconds remaining.

"We showed character at the beginning and end, but in the middle ... we gotta work on that," Cougars coach Simon Bitanga said.

Bitanga scored a game-high 15 points and Arce and Alissa Song each added 10 points.

Ross led Leilehua with 11 points and McBride added 10 points, all but one in the first half.



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