Bridgeport Fillies frustrate Moses Lake Christian girls

Pressure defense ignites Fillies to tournament championship

MOSES LAKE - For the Moses Lake Christian Academy girls basketball team, Friday night's 56-42 loss was best summed up in one word - frustration.

The Lady Lions played a sharp first half, protecting the ball and utilizing their top offensive weapons en route to a 29-22 lead at halftime.

But the second half was a completely different story. The Bridgeport Fillies' full-court pressure defense turned up the heat, forcing Moses Lake Christian into mistake after mistake. The Fillies scored 34 of the final 47 points and ran away with the championship trophy of the Lions' holiday tournament.

Moses Lake Christian head coach Emerson Ferguson had few good things to say in his post-game comments.

"They don't believe in themselves," Ferguson said. "They don't think they should win the game, and when you believe that, you don't deserve to win the game."

The Lady Lions committed 19 turnovers after the half, almost all a direct result of Bridgeport's pressure. Moses Lake Christian's most glaring weakness - the lack of a true point guard - meant the Lions were constantly forcing long passes instead of dribbling out of corners.

"I don't have a true point guard," Ferguson said. "And that kills us, because no one wants to handle the pressure."

Moses Lake Christian bolted to a 12-5 lead after five minutes, as guards Kristina Firouzi and Jessica Jachetta led the attack from outside and posts Heidi Sandberg and Esther Timofeyev did likewise in the low blocks. Timofeyev's fast-break lay-up off a good pass from Chelsea Allsbrook put the Lions' lead at 16-9 after one quarter.

The Lions were consistently able to find Timofeyev - their leading scorer - in the first half, and the 5-11 junior helped put the Fillies into some serious foul trouble. It was a strategy they got away from completely in the second half, and Timofeyev finished with only eight points to go along with 10 rebounds and three steals.

"I stressed that we've got to get the ball in to Esther," Ferguson explained. "As a coach, I don't know what more to do than tell them.

"There's a point where a coach does everything he can do to get his team prepared, and it's up to them to take the next step," he added. "Sometimes we do it, sometimes we don't."

Bridgeport held Moses Lake Christian scoreless for the first five minutes of the second half, and eventually took a 32-31 lead on an Ali Bustos free throw. Firouzi nailed a 3-pointer from the left wing to regain the lead for the Lions, but the Fillies tied it at 36-all going to the fourth quarter.

Bridgeport's pressure had only caused problems to that point, but the problems became a disaster. The Fillies went on a 13-0 run to start the fourth. Bustos, who scored a game-high 20 points, bookended the surge with a trey and a breakaway layup.

Sandberg recorded a double-double for the Lions, leading them with 11 points and 12 rebounds. Firouzi added eight, though the freshman was just 2 for 9 from long range. Jachetta had seven points, six boards, four steals and three assists.

Bridgeport's Rachael Bisque had a solid all-around game with 12 points, five rebounds, four assists and four steals, while Kayla Craig notched 10 points and nine boards.

The Fillies limited the Lions to 22 percent field goal shooting and outscored them by 10 at the free-throw line in the second half.

Ferguson chalked up his team's second-half collapse to panic.

"They don't like pressure - that's basketball, but they don't like it," he said. "Teams that press like that are effective against us because we fold. …The games that we have lost this season were games like that."

Moses Lake Christian will begin North Central League play at Mansfield on Friday at 6 p.m. This week's practice sessions figure to be more difficult as the coach indicated a change of attitude must happen now.

"Maybe I've been too nice. Maybe I need to be a little bit more strict at practice," Ferguson said. "We're too good of a team to play that bad."