Double header night raises funds for cancer
In a back-to-back night for both the men and women’s basketball teams, came away with both a win and a loss, respectively, all while raising funds for cancer Friday, Feb. 14 at home.
Freshman guard, Austin Pope said, “A lot of people came out and supported us for our last home game. It was for a great cause and that’s what it was all about.”
In their final home games of the season, both teams faced Long Beach City College, with the men earning a 70-66 victory and the women falling 58-50 at the Coaches vs. Cancer fundraiser event.
The night was dedicated to raising funds for cancer awareness, as the entrance had a desk where one could pitch a donation for a treatment to the illness.
“It’s just an outstanding opportunity for basketball to give back and provide an opportunity for people to help find a cure,” Russ May, men’s basketball head coach, said. “A sporting event like this, it’s a good opportunity to get people’s awareness and get contributions to help solve that problem.”
Alii Salone, sophomore forward added, “I think it’s great, it’s great awareness. We wore our pink socks for it. We didn’t just look past it. We recognized it.”
A silver lining in the women’s close-margin loss to the Vikings.
Freshman guard Cassidy Carrillo praised the team for “battling” toward the end. Rebounding was a problem, with Cerritos College being out-rebounded 43-34. “We let (the Vikings) have a lot of offensive rebounds. We needed to box-out, more,” Carrillo said.
Rebounding was a factor, but the shooting was perhaps the biggest, as the Falcons shot 29.4 percent from the field, compared to the Vikings’ 36.8 percent.
“We put the ball down low in the post, but some shots didn’t go in. They (the Vikings) had good pressure, but we should have shot better,” she said.
Both games were tightly contested and mirrored each other to an extent; both Falcons teams faced a Vikings squad that pressured them with full-court defense, forcing shots around the basket, as opposed to taking the ball inside.
The women were knotted at 47 at one point with 4:07 to go, but the aforementioned defense held off the team, forcing it to intentionally foul and ultimately losing the game.
“Some people didn’t come in to help,” Salone said. “It goes back to that composure that we need to work on.”
A late three by the Vikings could have pushed the men’s game into overtime, but it rattled out and the men came away with a close victory.
Pope said, “We go hard at each other in practice, so it translated to this game. We knew it was tough because it was for the league championship. We knew we had to step it up and play through it.”
The loss puts the women up in the air in terms of seeding, as a win was needed in order to clinch a piece of the division title, according to the Cerritos Falcons website.
The men, however, managed to clinch a piece of the title.
The men now have a 17-9 overall record, while the women have a 15-11 overall record.
Both teams will continue their season Friday, Feb. 21 in away bouts against Los Angeles Harbor College.
