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Photo courtesy of Liam Davis
Photo courtesy of Liam Davis

Pirates capture LAVC Tourney crown!

LOS ANGELES -- It was a stellar weekend of basketball for the Orange Coast College women's basketball team as the Pirates went 3-0 and won the L.A. Valley College's Buddy's All-State Classic Tournament with victories over San Diego Mesa (69-50), LAVC (89-47) and Long Beach City (69-60).

In Thursday's opener against the Olympians (9-3), a close game after one quarter was taken over by the back-to-back state champs as the Pirates (11-2) outscored Mesa 34-19 in the middle two quarters to pull ahead for good. Alyssa Dreessen, this weekend's tournament MVP, led Coast with 20 points, nine rebounds and six blocks, while Melaiah Joseph added 17 points. Kayla Borgelt's five steals anchored an OCC defense which forced Mesa into 21 turnovers.

On Friday, Coast took on the host Monarchs (5-6) and cruised to an easy win. The Pirates won every quarter of play, including a 25-5 advantage in the second quarter, which allowed OCC to roll from there. Zoie Lamkin sparked the offense with 21 points, while Hailey Estrada tacked on 15 points, seven rebounds and five assists and Xio Cardona and Miya Collins each tossed in 12. 

In the tourney championship against the Vikings (8-5), Coast fell behind, 20-16 early in the second quarter before an 18-3 Pirate run gave OCC the lead for good. 

Long Beach hung around until early in the fourth, when the Pirates used another strong offensive surge to pull away from the Vikings and capture the tourney title.

Joseph paced the Pirate offense with 24 points to go along with eight rebounds, while Dreessen added 16 points, 12 rebounds and five blocks. Lamkin was solid from the free-throw line (5-of-7) and finished with 13 points. 

Ranked No. 3 in the state, the Pirates continue their brutal nonconference schedule with three games this weekend against three more state-ranked opponents at the Moorpark College Tournament. Coast will take on No. 16 Fresno City College on Thursday (3 p.m.), No. 1-ranked College of the Sequoias on Friday (3 p.m.) and No. 8-ranked San Joaquin Delta College on Saturday (1 p.m.). 

Thus far, of OCC's soon-to-be 16 nonconference opponents, 14 of those games will be against teams ranked in state's top-25 poll. The rest of the OEC has played 15 ranked teams, with Cypress topping the rest of the squads with six games against top-25 programs.

The Pirates will have their next home game on Wednesday, Jan. 8 against Cypress, beginning at 5 p.m.

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Meyer Saad
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