GIRLS HOOPS: South Pas holds La Canada scoreless for entire 2nd quarter and nearly half of the 3rd in 52-27 rout that creates logjam atop the RHL …

LA CANADA-FLINTRIDGE — So much for the La Canada High School girls basketball team running away with the Rio Hondo League title.

South Pasadena put a stop to that in a big way on Wednesday night thanks to a hot start and a unrelenting defense. The visiting Tigers held first-place La Canada scoreless for the entire second quarter and almost half of the third en route to a 52-27 win.

“We knew we had to play our best game against La Canada and the girls came out ready to go,” Tigers coach Tammy Lai said. “We’re getting better. We’re still pretty young.”

The win improved South Pasadena to 16-4 overall and 4-1 in league. The Tigers’ loss last week to San Marino combined with La Canada’s 4-0 start in league had the Spartans sitting pretty entering Wednesday as they could have finished the first round of Rio Hondo play perfect. Instead, La Canada fell to 13-8.

While La Canada threw up bricks in the second quarter, South Pasadena was busy parlaying its high-energy defense into points. The Tigers took their first double-figure lead of the game three munutes into the second quarter and had the lead up to 18 at halftime thanks to a layup by Kristen Kafkaloff.

La Canada wasn’t any better offensively to start the second half and South Pasadena capitalized by eventually taking a 36-10 lead in third quarter. That would be the Tigers’ biggest margin of the game, and the damage was more than done.

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