The Bakersfield College women’s basketball team held the last game of the season against Glendale at BC and lost 50-49 Feb. 20.
Sophomore guard Ashlee Taira talked about the loss after the game.
“It was the most disappointing game I’ve played in a while. Being a sophomore and wanting to win, so it was probably the most disappointing game of the season,” she said.
Glendale was the first team to score and mainly dominated the boards in the first half of the game. Freshman guard Alexi Smith put BC on the board first for the Renegades. BC was behind at halftime with the score 22-15.
Coach Paula Dahl talked about the first half of the game and why BC was not making shots.
“Stress, what happens when you get so stressed is you freeze up. The reason why I know it was stress, was because our shots were horrible. Some of the sophomores recognized this as their last game, they want to do well, so at halftime I told them to run and relax. Once we started to relax, our shots started falling in,” said Dahl.
Taira also talked about the first half of the game and what Dahl told the team during halftime.
“During halftime she told us that we just needed to relax, just be true to ourselves so we started to mess around and relax,” said Taira.
BC gained control of the scoreboard in the second half and with six minutes left on the clock, BC led 44-36.
With seconds left on the clock sophomore forward Lakai Banks-Dean had two free throws and made one to make the score 50-49 Glendale.
Banks-Dean talked about her free throws after the game and said, “There was definitely a lot of pressure, because it’s like if you make two then we are tied and the game goes into overtime. Making the first free throw I was relieved and the second I was like OK and praying a little too hard.”
With eight seconds left, Glendale continued to foul BC to waste the time and win the game.
Taira talked about the season overall and said, “It was OK, I would have liked to win more games, but you can’t win them all. But overall the season was fun and we had a good time.”
Banks-Dean also commented on the end of the season after the game.
“We definitely improved from the beginning of the season to the end, and that’s basically what it is about. I can say everyone stepped up their game,” said Banks-Dean.
On Feb. 17, BC beat Santa Monica 79-75. Dahl talked about that game and said, “Wednesday night’s game was rewarding, we really came together as a team and that’s all we can ask of them, they are really good kids, they wanted to do well and I’m going to really miss my sophomores. On Wednesday, it was unbelievable because they are number two in conference. It was awesome,” said Dahl.
BC ended the season 9-16 overall and 4-7 in Western State Conference.