Mira Costa and Redondo will meet for a fourth time this season when the rivals square off at Redondo in the CIF Southern California Regional Division 2 girls basketball semifinals Tuesday at 7 p.m.
Mira Costa hopes to have a better showing than its sub-par performance in the CIF Southern Section Division 2AA championship game when the Sea Hawks dominated the Mustangs 60-37.
Despite the wide margin of victory, Redondo and Mira Costa earned the second and third seeds, respectively, in the State Championships.
“That just goes to show how much the CIF respects the Bay League,” Redondo coach Marcelo Enriquez said.
Redondo (25-7) earned the rematch after defeating visiting South Torrance 57-47 Saturday evening.
Amiete Nyingifa scored a game-high 14 points and added eight rebounds to pace Redondo. Mica Enriquez scored 12 points, including three 3-pointers, and Kyra Hamlin contributed 10 points in the win.
Jaryn Fajardo led South with 12 points. Alexis Henry scored 11 points and Kasey Takahashi added 10.
South outscored Redondo 12-3 late in the game to trim a 17-point deficit to eight but it was too little, too late.
While Redondo was taking care of business, Mira Costa (26-7) was running by visiting Santa Barbara 52-31, a team Redondo needed to come from behind to beat 59-54 in the CIF-SS Division 2AA semifinals.
Mira Costa’s strategy of blanketing Don’s leading scorer Amber Melgoza paid off. Melgoza was averaging 33.5 points per game.
“We brought in the whole concept of man-to-man with extraordinary help, always identifying where No. 4 (Melgoza) was on the floor,” Mira Costa coach John Lapham said. “Halle Maeda and Laura Sheckter did great individual jobs at guarding her. She didn’t score until the fourth quarter. For a kid that scored 50 in one playoff game and 40 in another, we’re really pleased with how that worked.”
Melgoza finished with 11 points; all coming in the final period after Lapham went to his bench ensuring his senior players would have the opportunity to see action in what would be their final home game in their prep career.
“We focused on stopping Amber,” Sheckter said. “Every time she drove, we had her covered.”
Sheckter said she and her teammates are looking forward to facing Redondo again.
“We’re going to practice hard on Monday,” the sophomore guard said. “It’s kind of like a movie playing out and we’re going to do everything we can to get to the state championship. We want to beat Redondo more than anything in the world and prove to them that we’re better.”
Maeda finished with 11 points including three 3 pointers. Allie Navarette and Patience Taylor each scored 10 points for Mira Costa.
Brackets and results are available at cifstate.org.
