VACAVILLE, Calif. – Senior wing Jadyn Weaver netted a team-high 14 points while junior guard Brianna McGahan added 12 points and four assists to lead St. Francis to a dominating 59-25 win over Will C. Wood in a season-opening girls' basketball doubleheader at Frank Molina Gymnasium Friday night.
The varsity victory followed an equally decisive JV Gold win for the Troubies, who took down the host Wildcats by a 55-15 final.
Each contest was marked by a long SF scoring run to start. JV opened with a 17-0 run in the first four minutes of the contest, not yielding a field goal until the 1:05 mark in the second quarter. Varsity poured in 13 unanswered in the first 3:40 of play, and did not give up a bucket until Wood senior Athena Brombacher slashed her way through the paint for a layup at the 3:45 mark.
The two wins were also the first at their respective levels for new varsity head coach Brittany Woodard, and JV Gold mentor John Bashore. Woodard previously served as an assistant JV Gold coach last year, while Bashore had helmed the JV Red squad before moving up to the older junior varsity program for 2022-23.
"I was nervous, I'm not going to lie," said Woodard after the game. "We wanted to get out and run, play like a team, and have energy. They came in 100 percent, especially for their first road game against a pretty solid team. I'm so proud of them."
Weaver scored 10 points in the first quarter, all in that 13-0 start. She converted an assist from McGahan for a three-pointer in the opening minute, then knocked down a corner three – again assisted by McGahan – with 6:17 to go. Weaver's runner in the lane made it 11-0 at 5:45, then she buried a 10-foot jumper just 25 ticks later.
McGahan was the Troubies' top scorer in the second quarter. After senior guard Emily Dusel kicked off the offense with her rebound and putback, the 2022 All-Delta League performer scored on back-to-back dimes from Lexi London, who became the first St. Francis freshman to open the season on the varsity team since Saniyiah Williams in 2017.
In addition to the offensive output, Coach Woodard commended her team's defense, which held the Wildcats to just six total field goals and initiated four fast-break scores in the second quarter. In particular, she singled out Dusel, who was tasked with guarding Wood's third-year varsity veteran Natalia Sanchez, one of the host's top scorers from last season. Sanchez managed only one point, hitting the front end of a one-and-one trip to the free-throw line.
"Our model is defense, defense, defense – on-ball pressure defense," Woodard said. "We hope that can translate into offense and easy buckets. Everyone was sharing the ball, trying to get stops. In the second half, we couldn't make a bucket, but even when the energy wasn't there, we still came together as a team."
The SF offense did go dormant in the third, with a McGahan drive in the first minute and an Aubrey O'Donnell free throw at the 4:28 mark providing the only scoring. Meanwhile, Wildcat junior Sa'Nyah Stewart found her shooting stroke with a pair of consecutive threes. That cut the Troubie lead to "only" 16 at 37-21, then neither team netted a field goal for the remainder of the frame.
St. Francis then scored eight straight to begin the fourth, extending its lead back to 25. Sydney Teoh drove for a basket in the opening seconds, McGahan inbounded an assist to Dusel at 6:37, junior Chidera Okoye scored two of her six on a lay-in with 5:48 to go, and Weaver delivered an up-and-under bucket on the next trip down. London and Okoye each scored four points in the fourth, while O'Donnell hit three more from the line for her six-point total in the contest.
In similar fashion to the varsity, JV Gold smothered its host defensively, surrendering only one field goal during the first three quarters of the game. Guard Mackenzie Tan lit up the scoreboard with eight points in the 23-4 first quarter, while Alexis Heise added another six and Colleen Medina notched five assists.
The Medina-to-Tan combination continued into the second on back-to-back transition scores, then Tan nearly went coast-to-coast on another fast break less than two minutes in. The Troubies led 39-7 at the halftime break, with Tan having scored 14.
St. Francis called off its press after the intermission, which also cooled off the offensive numbers – 22 of its 39 first-half points came on the fast break. The lack of a working shot clock also allowed the Troubies to control tempo even further, with a Tan basket and two baseline scores from Lilian Vicio accounting for the only points from either team in the third.
Wood managed to break in to double digits when Taiya Ebuen hit two threes and a layup in the final quarter. She notched all four of her team's points in the first quarter from the charity stripe, giving her 12 points overall. Meanwhile, Heise scored six points in the final frame: two on second-chance opportunities and one on an inbound-pass from Medina. Her final rebound-putback came at the buzzer, giving the Troubies their 40-point margin.
Both teams return to action to host Del Oro for a Monday night doubleheader. Until then, the St. Francis JV Red squad has the actual 2022-23 home opener: a 10 a.m. tilt against Del Campo on Saturday. Tickets for all Troubie home games are available exclusively via GoFan at https://gofan.co/app/school/CA8032?activity=Basketball.
