Turlock high girls basketball is off to a 3-1 start in preseason, but that doesn’t mean they are satisfied, not even a little bit. Especially not coach Candace Sakuda, despite the Bulldogs' 57-29 victory over Los Banos in Tuesday’s home preseason contest.
“It was an ugly win, we definitely came out flat...yes, we got a win but it was an ugly win,” said Sakuda. “However, we are never satisfied and now we are focused on our next opponent.”
Next for the Bulldogs is the three-day Modesto Christian tournament competing against some of the best teams in the Section beginning on Thursday against an opponent yet to be named.
With Tuesday’s win, the ‘Dogs have now won two straight by 17-points or more.
It wasn’t pretty, but it worked in the end against a Los Banos Tigers who are expected to compete for a Western Athletic Conference title this upcoming season.
Turlock managed to just score eight in the opening quarter while still limiting the Tigers' opportunities as the first quarter ended with an 8-7 score.
Turlock never trailed for the remainder of the game as they went into halftime leading 28-13 after a 20-6 run in the second quarter that was anchored by four three-pointers.
Despite the large lead, Turlock turned the ball over 10 times in the first half alone.
The Bulldogs started executing and played up to their level to start off the third.
The top scorer of the night was Jaydon Williams who busted the game wide open after turning a steal into a bucket in the opening minute to give her team a 32-13 lead and from there the ‘Dogs surged into a 12-5 run to end the third up 44-18.
Hope Salsig was second on the team behind Jaydon Williams with 13 points for the game and Shea Williams followed with 10. Sarah Musselman added seven points.
“The girls performed well in the second half but the first half was rough for sure,” said Sakuda. “If we come out for our next game looking like this then the rest of the season isn’t going to be pretty, so we need to realize we can’t come out flat like this, even though we did win, we can’t be satisfied not playing up to our basketball.”
Turlock closed out the fourth with a 13-11 run and secured their third win in four games played.
“We are only four games in so it’s nice they are making these mistakes early on because we have time to fix them in the long run. Come league we should have it down,” Sakuda added. “We need to work on these things, the little things, the fine tuning part, which we lacked today.”
Turlock will take on an opponent yet to be named at the MC tournament at a time yet to be announced Thursday.
