PC women roll by Taft

The Porterville College women’s basketball team made a statement that it plans to finish in the upper half of the Central Valley Conference standings.

Porterville picked up its most impressive win in a while, routing a team that normally finishes in the upper half of the CVC standings, beating Taft 76-53 on Wednesday. Porterville led 41-25 at halftime and never looked back in improving to 2-0 in conference.
And while the Pirates will be a huge underdog, they did set up a showdown for first in the CVC on Saturday at Fresno City.

A key to Wednesday’s win was PC’s box-in-one defense in which it used to contain Taft’s leading scorer, Erica Evans, who was averaging more than 20 points a game. Eva Gutierrez and Jackie Padron combined to contain Evans, who finished with 13 points on 4-of-14 shooting, including 1-of-7 from three-point range.

PC coach Dave Kavern said Gutierrez and Padron “never let her get in any kind of rhythm,” commenting on Evans. “Those two did a nice job shutting down their best player.”

Maribel Bravo hit three threes on her way to scoring 16 points and added five rebounds, four assists, two steals and one block, Gutierrez scored 14 points, Katrina Goulbourne and Alia Alvarez had 11 points and Destiny Zarate added 10 points.

Even though Taft had three players who were at least 6 feet tall, led by Zarate, Bravo and Goulbourne, PC outrebounded Taft 47-44. Portervlle also received a boost from Pirate volleyball standout Nayeli Colunga, who made her basketball debut on Wednesday.

“It was a great team effort,” Kavern said. “We really had two great days of practice.”
Kavern said his team had solid practices despite four of his players missing a portion of those practices due to a chemistry lab. “My belief is you take your classes,” Kavern said.

Kavern also said he appreciated the community support, saying there was a nice crowd for the game.