ABOVE: Freshman point guard Victoria Gamez looks off an O’Connor defender to open up a passing lane to senior Karissa Caldera.

by Maria Garcia

Last Friday, the girls varsity basketball team competed against the Brennan Bears. They played a tough four quarters and finished the game with a win of 60-56. Here’s what head coach Gerald McCaslin had to say after the game:

“I felt really good about the Brennan game. I think everybody played well. We had Giselle out, so everybody stepped up and contributed. We finally are learning how to win ball games at the end, which is big. We finally learned how to close gaps and how to close teams out in the fourth quarter,” McCaslin said.

Coach McCaslin highlighted two key players from the game against Brennan, senior shooting guard, Karissa Caldera, junior post player, Amaya West, and sophomore post player, Alissa Martinez.

“I would say Amaya stepped up. She had a bad game, but she still contributed defensively and on the boards. I think that Alissa stepped up; she led the team. She was one of the catalyst for scoring a lot of points for us being able to get over the hump. I think Karissa did a good job. She finally just calmed down, showed her senior leadership, and help close out a team. She has the most experience and has played varsity for four years. She’s played in a lot of big games, so she showed a lot of leadership, a lot of poise going into that game,” McCaslin said.

McCaslin informs fans about a few lead scorers from the game, Karissa Caldera, Alissa Martinez, and freshman point guard Victoria Gamez.

“Victoria had 13. Alissa had 15. Karissa had 14. They were my lead scorers. Diamond chipped in, she had 8. She had a huge game for us. Amaya had 10 boards. Everybody did a little bit of everything that we needed them to do in order to get us past,” McCaslin said.

The first time the girls took on the Marshall Rams, they came out victorious as well with a score of 50-43. Coach McCaslin discusses his mentality for tonight’s matchup.

“I feel good about it. I think we’ve gotten tremendously better. I think we’re starting to get the experience we need to win ball games. I just hope that they don’t take for granted that as we’re getting better, other teams are getting better. I feel like sometimes we can get complacent. We just have to play our basketball game, do what we have to do, and everything else takes care of itself for us,” McCaslin said.

Coach McCaslin gives insight on the slight change he’s making tonight in order to honor his senior players.

“There’s no changes. We’re not changing anything, nothing our style besides the lineup being changed to honor some of our players who have been here for four years. Other then that, we’re not going to change anything. We’re going to play hard nose, play D, get up and down, and crash the boards like we’ve always done,” McCaslin said.

Make sure to go out and support the Lady Husky Varsity Girls in their last game of the season against the Marshall Rams tonight at Paul Taylor Field House at 6pm.