FULLERTON — A bad second quarter spelled doom for the Santa Barbara High girls basketball team in its CIF Division 1 State Regional quarterfinal game at second-seeded Troy.
The Warriors outscored the Dons 20-4 in the quarter and pulled away to a 72-54 victory on Saturday night.
“The second quarter killed us,” Santa Barbara coach Andrew Butcher said.
The Dons played well in the first quarter and trailed by one, 18-17. But turnovers, getting beat in transition and poor shot selection hurt them in the second quarter and Troy took full advantage of the mistakes.
“Troy is a really good team. They shoot the three and go to the basket,” Butcher said. “They played a 1-3-1 zone and had Amber double teamed most of the time.”
Dons star and Washington-bound Amber Melgoza still finished with 31 points on 10 of 18 shooting, including 5 of 9 on 3-pointers. She also grabbed nine rebounds.
“I don’t think anybody was better than her in the Open Division,” said Butcher. Melgoza averaged 31 points playing against the elite teams in the CIF. Troy won the Open Division consolation bracket.
Sophomore Alondra Jimenez was the only other Dons player to score in double figures with 11 points. Junior Kimberly Gebhardt grabbed six rebounds.
Melgoza scored more than 2700 points in her four-year varsity career and is far and away the school’s all-time scoring leader.
Jada Howard started every game in her four years on varsity.
Butcher said the seniors on the squad played in 106 games in their careers, went to the state tournament all four years, played in 11 state tournament games, won a CIF-Southern Section championship and played in a total of 27 playoff games.
“There are some schools that haven’t played in that many playoff games,” said Butcher.
Santa Barbara finishes the season at 27-5.
“We had an outstanding year,” said Butcher.
— Noozhawk sports editor Barry Punzal can be reached at bpunzal@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.