Unbeaten NDB claims 10th straight ‘W’ to start season

The two identical seasons should come as no surprise. NDB returned its starting five from last year’s Central Coast Section Division IV semifinal squad, an all-upperclassman group that has played together for three years.

“Honestly, I think [last year] probably exceeded even my expectations,” NDB head coach Sam Rossi said. “I knew we were going to be good, but I was like: ‘Wow! We’re really going for it!’ And now, this year, I think we’re just the veterans.”

Third-year junior starter Sammy Kakala led the way Thursday with a double-double of 23 points and 14 rebounds. As the strong 5-10 center goes on offense, so go the Tigers. NDB shot 39.1% from the field overall, but was 7 of 11 in the second quarter, with Kakala totaling 11 points over that stretch.

“She’s definitely my favorite person to play with,” said NDB junior Mika Cary, a third-year starting guard and a teammate of Kakala’s on the AAU club circuit since middle school. “I’ve been playing with her over four or five years. And, yeah, we love playing together. And she means a lot to the team.”

Kakala and Cary feed off one another’s energy, Rossi said. And that energy was on display in the closing minute of Thursday’s win.

After the Tigers led by as much as 11 in the third quarter, and took a 38-30 advantage into the fourth, TKA (8-3) rallied back to cut it to 42-39 with 2:04 to play when junior Jessica Kim drilled a corner 3. Amid the one-possession game, however, the Lady Knights came up empty on their next two chances. When NDB got the ball back, again, Cary made sure there wouldn’t be a third chance.

The junior got to the free-throw line with under a minute to play, and after missing her first attempt, was able to hit the second to push it back to a two-possession contest. But before TKA ever got a chance to answer back, Cary hawked the inbound pass for a strip steal and took it straight to the cylinder for a layup to make it 45-39 with 49 seconds to go.

“Whenever I’m on defense, I always try to see if there’s a little opening I can get though there,” Cary said. “It happened to work out in my favor, but I think it was a team effort. Our defense was good, our rotation was good. So, I was able to get that steal, which was really nice.”

Cary finished with 12 points, including three 3s before the flurry in the final minute.

“She’s an upperclassman now, and a point guard,” Rossi said. “So, I have all the faith in Mika. So, to knock those free throws down, to knock her shot down, she’s been doing an amazing job bringing up the ball and running the offenses that we want. So, she definitely has taken over that leadership role.”

NDB led most of the way, responding to a game-opening 3 from TKA sophomore Callie Nishitoyo by going on a 7-0 run. The Knights caught NDB at the end of the first quarter to tie it 13-13, but with the game tied 15-all early in the second, Kakala and the Tigers went on an 8-0 run and never trailed again.

Early foul trouble forced Rossi to early bench rotations in the first half, but junior Natalie Cabral seemed to feed off the extra minutes. Cabral was the first player off the bench for NDB, and her aggressive man defense spurred the Tigers in the second half, as TKA went nearly five minutes before scoring its first points out of the break.

“She’s just so quick,” Rossi said. “And I think she could probably play an eight-quarter game if we needed her to. So, her coming in really helps us out.”

Even with the Knights scoring in transition off a Nishitoyo steal to get on the board in the second half, their first two baskets were both on sloppy NDB turnovers. The Tigers didn’t give up a bucket on defense until Nishitoyo drained a 3 with 1:44 remaining in the third quarter.

“I definitely think we’ve had stretches like that,” Rossi said. “That’s probably been the longest. But we’ve definitely come out in a couple of games, and if we play that aggressive defense, it gets us going. Especially offensively.”

“We kind of got a little tired, and I think they stepped it up on ‘D,’” TKA head coach Robin Young said. “We had a lot of very sad possessions, and we started something new that got us moving, second wind, and that opened up some shots for us.”

Nishitoyo shared the game-high with 23 points, and added seven rebounds. And it was her back-to-back 3s to open the fourth quarter that closed the score to 38-36 and gave the Knights a chance. It was a clutch wing 3 from Cary that put NDB back in the driver’s seat.

“We’ve been talking about it all week, how we thought this would be a four-quarter game,” Rossi said. “Every year we play them, it’s just a tough game.”