San Marcos girls basketball turned in a solid performance but fell to Hart by a score of 61-50 on Thursday in the Thunderhut.
The Royals (1-1) dropped to .500 on the young season while the Indians (1-1), who reached the CIF Div. 2AA Championship game last season, picked up their first win of the year.
“I thought this would be a good matchup in the preseason to give us a barometer of where we are for league,” San Marcos coach Tiffany Simms said. “We’re fairly young again and I think we did a great job.
“Every game up until league I’m just asking the girls to get better at the things we need to get better at and I think they did that.”
Hart got off to a quick start, rattling off the first seven points of the game in the first four minutes of play.
However, the Royals punched right back with an 11-4 run to knot the game up at 11-11 with 1:32 to go in the first quarter. In that run, Mia Martinez-Tomatis scored four points and Natasha Stapf drained a corner three.
Both teams went back and forth to end the quarter, with San Marcos’ Carley Nielsen hitting a layup with 14 seconds left to send the game into the second tied at 14-14.
In the second quarter, Hart went into a tough full-court press that caused several turnovers by the Royals, allowing the Indians to take control of the game. Thanks to plenty of steals and fast-break buckets, the Indians led 35-25 at halftime.
San Marcos came out of the half and found some success fighting through the full-court press, cutting the lead to as low as five thanks to a three-pointer by Gianna Mandarino with 2:31 left in the quarter to bring the score to 43-38.
“We missed some assignments, but when you ask them to re-correct they re-correct, I couldn’t have asked for more,” Simms said.
However, that was as close as the game got from there. At the end of the third, Hart led 48-40 and they carried that momentum over to the fourth, where they closed out a 61-50 victory. San Marcos struggled to contain Hart’s Morgan Mack, who ended with 21 points.
“We need to attack the basket more,” Simms said of the team’s offensive attack. “They didn’t stop our drive, we stopped ourselves.”
The Royals continued to fight, though, scoring the final five points off the night thanks to a layup by Sophia Hale and a three-pointer from Natasha Bender.
Mariia Shtykova was the lone player in double-digits for San Marcos with 10 points. She was followed up by Natasha Stapf, who chipped in nine points to go along with 11 rebounds.
“I’m happy overall with the outcome,” Simms said. “We got better from last game, our pressure on defense was better, our offense was more organized.
“That boosts their confidence… I think they showed they can hold their own.”
The Royals will look to get back over .500 when they take on Roosevelt on Monday.
