The Lady Cougars’ district championship season came to an end after falling to the Three Rivers Lady Bulldogs, 25-17, 25-18, 25-20 in the Class 2A area round playoffs Saturday afternoon at Bishop High School.
With the first game knotted at 11, the Lady Bulldogs’ aggressive attack and experience took over, finishing on a 14-6 run to take a 1-0 lead in sets and the momentum for the rest of the match. The Lady Cougars never looked comfortable against the Lady Bulldogs’ size and athleticism.
“The momentum shifted halfway through that game because (Three Rivers) got settled into their system faster than we did,” said Santa Maria head coach Sofia Garcia. “We never got set into our system. We knew they were going to be tall, big and be hitting. We tried to make adjustments last minute, but defensively, I feel we played an awesome game.”
In the second set, the Lady Bulldogs jumped out to a 14-4 lead, but Santa Maria was able to cut the lead down to three points later in the match.
“We just didn’t have that push in the end and I think it had a lot to do with our inexperience,” Garcia said.
The Lady Bulldogs move on to face Yorktown in the regional quarterfinals, but their coach feels that there is still room to improve after Saturday’s performance.
“I think our girls just wanted it bad after our team was beat in the first round last year,” said Three Rivers head coach Doris Johanson. “We have played better, but I feel like when we have a lead, we tend to relax and we can’t have that going forward.”
Santa Maria shared the District 32-2A title for the first time in four seasons, but has never made it past the area round of the playoffs. Next year, however, they’ll return everyone from this season.
“We ended up 7-1 in league play and 33-10 overall,” Garcia said. “Next year we know what we need to work on and I expect them to come back and work hard.
“We have never been able to get past area, but this is the toughest we’ve played and hopefully next year will be the year we get there.”