The improvement seems to be continuing. The Pirates shot a season-best 48 percent from the floor, hitting nine 3-pointers in the process of easily handling Pierce College 80-43 Saturday night in Woodland Hills. Point guard Aubri Smith had another solid outing with 22 points on 10-13 shooting, 10 assists, four rebounds and two steals for VC (16-5, 3-0).
Things got started slowly for both teams. Pierce hit a 3-pointer at the 17:25 mark to take a short-lived 3-2 lead, and Makenna Murray answered with a drive and lay-up to give the Pirates the lead for good. Three straight 3-pointers from the Pirates , one by Brooke Zamora and the second two by Carolyn Ruffino, opened up a 15-7 lead for VC with 11:19 on the clock.
Ventura was ahead 17-12 with nine minutes remaining when they went on a 9-0 run to open things up. Zamora opened the run with a triple and Murray closed it with a deuce and a charity toss to put VC ahead 26-12 with 5:44 on the clock. Ventura had a 10-point run in the closing minutes of the first half, and led at halftime 40-18.
The Pirates scored the first eight points of the second half, and the game was essentially over from that point. Carly Maciel's 3-pointer at the buzzer gave the Pirates their biggest lead of the night, and the final score of 80-43.
Micaela Pericone-Kapp scored 14 points, all in the second half, while pulling in five rebounds with a pair of steals. Ruffino finished with 11 points and Murray had nine points, five rebounds and three assists. Sandra Ortiz hauled in a team-high nine boards and Christina Gonzalez had eight caroms. As a team, VC had 18 assists and only 13 turnovers while hitting 9-22 from behind the 3-point line (45 percent).
Ventura returns home on Wednesday Jan. 21 to host Santa Barbara City College in a 7:00 pm contest. The game will be preceded by the Pirate men at 5:00 pm at the Athletic Event Center.