Dana Hills girls basketball finds way past Villa Park and into CIF-SS semifinals – Orange County Register

DANA POINT — The Dana Hills girls basketball team reached the CIF-SS semifinals for the first time by beating Villa Park 49-41 Wednesday in the Division 3A quarterfinals at Dana Hills High.

The Dolphins (27-4) will play JSerra on the road Saturday in the semifinals. Dana Hills also qualified for the CIF State playoffs for the first time.

“The girls have been locked in,” Dana Hills coach Shevy Akason said. “They’ve been playing together since the third or fourth grade. What’s amazing is our older girls have allowed our younger girls to be locked in. They love each other and you can see it.”

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Villa Park (19-11) won the North Hills League this season and beat Victor Valley and Gabrielino in the first two rounds of the playoffs.

Dana Hills won the Sea View League and beat Cajon and California High in the first two rounds.

Freshman Kayla Rice led the Dolphins in scoring this season with 19.3 points per game. She was held scoreless in the first half Wednesday, but finished with a game-high 16 points.

“We had a hard time finding pockets for her to score so we just made a couple little tweaks in the locker room,” Akason said. “She has a real knack for finding open space. We found little pockets…it worked really well.”

“I wasn’t doing too well in the first half so second half I knew I needed to get going,” Rice said. “My teammates helped me out tremendously. I had to pay it back to them.”

Rice’s teammates did a good job of keeping the team slightly ahead in the first half without her scoring. Regan Akason had six points in the first half while Brooklyn Akason and Madison Dellner each added five points.

“It was fun to see some girls step up early when we needed them to step up,” Akason said.

Dana Hills outrebounded Villa Park 36-25 which led to some crucial second-chance points for the Dolphins. Junior Lola Bellon was all over the court for the Dolphins with five points, 10 rebounds and seven assists. Bellon also guarded Villa Park’s top scorer entering the game, Bailey Roczey.

“Lola is our glue girl,” Akason said. “We didn’t name a captain right away because we weren’t sure who it was going to be, and she emerged about a month into the season and it was clear she was our captain on and off the court.”

“They asked who wanted to defend her (Roczey) and I said I did and I did,” Bellon said.

Roczey had 12 points for Villa Park and led the defense with two steals and two blocks. Olivia Sturdivant led the Spartans in scoring with 14 points. Madelyn Martinez had a quality game off the bench with six points and seven rebounds.

Dana Hills has not played JSerra since 2011, but Akason said the teams are familiar with each other from playing club basketball against each other. The JSerra team came to watch the second half in person Wednesday and the Dolphins noticed their presence.

“We’ve been watching them throughout the season. A lot of people had us ranked 1 and 2 (in the division) throughout the year,” Akason said. “They are going to be tough.”

“I’ve watched them play during the season and I was like, ‘I want to play them,’ so I’m excited,” Rice said.