Above: St. Paul’s Pricilla Hidalgo drives to the basket past Brentwood’s
Kennedy Martin in the first half of Saturday’s CIF-SS playoff basketball
game. Brentwood won, 49-41.
(Staff photo by Keith Birmingham)
BRENTWOOD – For the third consecutive season the St.Paul girls basketball team couldn’t get over the final hump and get into the championship game.
The host Brentwood Eagles proved to be too much down the stretch and defeated the Swordsmen 49-41 in a CIF Southern Section Division 4A semifinal Saturday afternoon.
Brentwood (21-8) will play either Campbell Hall or L.A. Baptist in the division finals next weekend.
St. Paul, a No. 2 seed in the division, dropped to 17-12.
The Eagles were led by sophomore point guard Drew Cabral with a game-high 18 points and sophomore center Kennedy Martin with 16.
St. Paul suffered a huge loss near the end of the second quarter when team leader Priscilla Hidalgo went down with an injury and didn’t return.
Holly Shafer finished with 12 points to lead the Swordsmen and junior forward Cassidy Carrillo had 10.
St. Paul coach Robert Miller: “I thought we battled back when Priscilla went down. It was a five- or six-point game at halftime and arguably our best offensive player goes down. Our younger players did a nice job to stay in the game.”
