Falcons Finish Second At Holiday Classic

The Falcons face three tough tests in their own tournament.

In the annual Christian Brothers Holiday Classic basketball tournament this past weekend, the Lady Falcons advanced all the way to the championship game.

Last Thursday, the Lady Falcons played the Lady Bruins of Ponderosa in the opening round. CB cruised to a 13 point lead after three quarters and at one point in the fourth quarter, the Falcons puts out a lineup of five freshmen en route to a 66-56 win.

Co-captain Niel Valmores (’13), who led the team in scoring during the foundation game, weighed in her thoughts about her teams performance.

“I think overall all that we did very well,” the senior says. “There was a lot of hard teams in the tournament and knew that — [The first game against Ponderosa] was easy, but each game got harder as played River City and then St. Mary’s.”

On Friday, the girls took on the Lady Raiders in the semifinal, turning a 31-22 halftime lead into a 57-51 victory.

Saturday’s game was the championship against perennial power in St. Mary’s of Stockton, who are annually amongst the top teams in the country.

Understandably so, this was a huge game for Lady Falcons, who were unsure themselves about the game.

“Being the underdog, we went in trying to keep [the matchup] under perspective,” explains Valmores.

By halftime the girls were down by 16, but that did not dismay the squad.

“At halftime we realized that we could play with them,” Valmores told the Talon.

Our Falcons continued to fight and it was evident that their confidence was rising as they began to force the Rams into making more mistakes. CB eventually brought the deficit down to six points in the 4th quarter.

“In the fourth, when we were only down by six, we were all a bit shocked,” Niel said.

Unfortunately the Lady Rams proved to be a little to strong for our Falcons as St. Mary’s came out with the victory and the championship. However, there is no doubt that this game is a confidence booster for our girls as they try to use this momentum to catapult them throughout the season, starting with a road game Tuesday against Rocklin High School.