Atwater girls fall at Turlock in CCC basketball

The Atwater High School girls basketball team couldn’t contain its frustration.

After every turnover, every bit of contact without a whistle and every rushed shot that didn’t fall, a little more eked out. Unfortunately for the Falcons, there was no shortage of all three on Tuesday night in Turlock.

The referees made it clear from the opening possession that lots of contact would be allowed, and Turlock took full advantage. The Bulldogs outworked and outmuscled Atwater for all four quarters, getting themselves back in the playoff race with a 46-31 win over Atwater.

The loss dropped Atwater (16-6, 3-3 Central California Conference) into a tie with Merced for the league’s third and final playoff spot. Turlock (11-11, 2-4) is a game back.

“It’s hard to play a game where the referees control such a big part of it, but at the same time, Turlock played their butts off,” Atwater coach J.R. Davis said. “They set the tone early, coming out with a physicality and aggressiveness that we never matched. The girls had every right to be frustrated, but we have to do a better job of playing through that.”

Coming off an emotional week with wins over Merced and Buhach Colony, Atwater took the court with little energy or attention to detail. Davis’ squad went scoreless on its first 17 possessions, turning over the ball 10 times and missing its first seven shots as Turlock took an 8-0 lead.

Heaven Mazon (eight points, nine rebounds) did her best to get things going, scoring five points to trim the Falcons’ deficit to 11-5 after one quarter. The spark wasn’t enough to ignite the offense overall, as Atwater hit just 3 of 28 shots from the field in the opening half to go with 17 turnovers.

Despite the Falcons’ struggles, Turlock couldn’t pull away until late. The Bulldogs extended their lead to 30-19 going into the fourth quarter, thanks to freshman forward Jaydon Williams (game-high 16 points, 16 rebounds), but Alondra Ponce answered for Atwater. The junior scored all of her team-high 11 points in the second half, including a put-back that trimmed the Falcons’ deficit to 34-28 with 5:15 to play.

“I honestly felt like we were still going to come back,” Mazon said. “When Alondra went on the run, it pumped me up. Unfortunately, too many of us, myself included, already had our heads out of the game.

“Coach told us coming into the game that we needed to expect bad refs in Turlock. And even though these ones were bad, they weren’t the worst we’ve ever had to play with. We should have been able to play through it. I think the problem was that we didn’t come mentally ready to play, and then when we weren’t getting any calls, it got in our heads.”

Morgan Nunes ended Atwater’s comeback hopes on Turlock’s next possession, draining a dagger three-pointer to push the Bulldogs’ lead to nine. Nunes hit four three-pointers that accounted for her 12 points as the Bulldogs pulled away down the stretch.

Merced 64, Buhach Colony 42 in Atwater – Jordan Pierce connected on five three-pointers and scored 21 points to lead the Bears (15-8, 3-3 CCC) over the Thunder (9-13, 0-6). Symone Gilliam had 16 points for the Bears.

Dos Palos 50, Firebaugh 44 in Firebaugh – Grace Schofield scored 17 points and Alexis Lara had 13 points to help the Broncos (9-6, 3-1 West Sierra) defeat the Eagles (7-11, 1-3).

This story was originally published January 26, 2016 at 11:11 PM with the headline "Atwater girls fall at Turlock in CCC basketball."