The City College women’s basketball team won its first game of the season by a single point, scoring 69-68 against Taft with a miraculous game-winning shot by freshman Sierra Cavaletto.
After Taft player Sara Martin scored a layup to put the team up 67-68 late in the fourth quarter, City College missed an opportunity for a possible game winner and was forced to foul Taft with 5.5 seconds left.
Fortunately for the Vaqueros, Taft missed both free throws, giving the Vaqueros 2.8 seconds to get a shot off for the win.
They decided to inbound the ball to freshman Sierra Cavaletto who hit a turn-around jumper off of a crafty play in which she set a screen and then opened up on the wing, giving City College a one-point lead with only .3 seconds remaining on the clock.
The crowd went berserk and her teammates mobbed her on the court afterwards.
“It was crazy, I don’t know,” Cavaletto commented on her shot. “It felt great but it went back to everything we did in practice.”
The game began as a fast-paced, aggressive battle in the first quarter that included 10 fouls and back-to-back threes by sophomore Meagan Moore.
Moore led the team with 19 points and 7 rebounds, but overall the scoring was very well-balanced between the players.
Some crafty layups by sophomore Aaliyah Pauling helped the Vaqueros edge their way to a 37-29 lead at half-time.
Taft came out fighting in the third quarter and outscored the Vaqueros 25-16, giving them a one-point lead going into the fourth quarter.
The fourth quarter went back and forth and the electricity from the crowd was tangible the entire time.
Meagan Moore hit some spectacular acrobatic layups down the stretch.
“My teammates were the ones who gave me the confidence to get to the basket,” Moore said.
Although she fouled out in the fourth quarter, she said “I wasn’t mad because I knew the team got my back.”
In the locker room, head coach Sandrine Krul told her team “We win as a team, and we lose as a team.”
“Our best players weren’t playing amazing but we are a team and I am very proud of our freshman hitting that type of shot,” Krul added.
“It was an excellent team win, everyone has to make big plays,” assistant coach Devin Engebretsen told the team after the game.
He reminded the players to not get too emotional, saying “the maturity needs to kick in” in order to prepare for their next game Saturday, Nov. 3 against Butte.
