Trojans play well in SoCal; win three games to place third

Steve White wasn't overly optimistic prior to his team leaving for the Southern California Holiday Prep Classic in San Diego. While his team had an 8-3 record up to that point, White felt his team might run into some trouble while playing in the tournament's premiere division against some of the top teams in the south, if not the state. He told the tournament director, however, that the premiere division is definitely where he wanted his team to be, because that's the best competition and that's where it's easiest to find your team's flaws and work on improving them. As it turned out, the Trojans had a great tournament, winning three of four games and placing third overall. White was thrilled, though he had little voice left having coached four games in four days. "We did a nice job defensively overall," White said. "The girls made good adjustments to figure out the opponents' strength and try to take that away. The tournament was a great way to end 2021. We had players contributing at both ends of the floor and hopefully the girls learned something. I think it was good for us. We played challenging, tough competition that gave us a good measure as to where we are. We've improved since we played Clovis West and improved with how we handle pressure. We've always got stuff to work on and right now it's trying to find a way to score some more points." The Trojans won their first two games of the tournament; first beating El Camino of Oceanside, 46-40, and then sneaking by Del Norte of San Diego, 49-46. The team's only loss came against Orangewood Academy, 52-42, before wrapping up the tournament with a 56-45 win over Sage Hill. Teagan Brown, Oak Ridge's lone all-tournament player, led the team in scoring each game; finishing with 16, 24, 17 and 21. Ella Ray scored 14, 9 and 10 in the first three games, while Abby Helwig finished with 10, 7 and 14 points in games one, two and four. Jessica Crannell scored seven points in the win over Sage Hill. Oak Ridge (11-4) opens league play at home Friday against Rocklin (9-4). "I think every team in our league is ranked in the top-25," White said. "We're not good enough to win when we have an off night, so we've got to come ready to play every game."