Casa girls shock Montgomery

Playing at home, the Lady Gauchos squeezed the Lady Vikings with an ever-tightning defense to record a 44-41 victory. The Casa win avenged an earlier loss at Montgomery and finished the Lady Vikings at 11-3 in league play, a game behind Santa Rosa's title-winning Lady Panthers, a 70-49 winner over Cardinal Newman Thursday night. Casa Grande finishes at 9-5 in third place.

The result means that Casa Grande gets an immediate rematch with Montgomery Tuesday night in the first round of the North Bay League Tournament involving the top four finishers. Cardinal Newman and Santa Rosa will repeat their game at Santa Rosa.

Thursday night's game at Casa Grande was all about defense and Casa's ability to limit the damage done by 6-foot, 3-inch Montgomery center Claire Donnelly, while sealing off the Lady Viking outside shooters, who did so much damage to Casa in the team's first meeting.

Donnelly, under constant defensive pressure from Angela LLaverias and Dayna Dolcini, still scored 15 points, but had to work for every basket. No other Lady Viking scored more than seven.

Brooke Santander with 11 points, Lyndsey Murnin with 10 and Lexi Schloetter with nine led the Lady Gauchos.