Wildcats girls basketball team advances to CIF finals

Mya Pierfax, shown here in a game earlier this season, scored 27 points for the Wildcats Saturday night. File photo

The best season in the history of the girls basketball program at Paloma Valley High School will continue Saturday, when the Wildcats play in the CIF-SS Division 4AA championship game against Ontario Christian.

Paloma earned that championship appearance with a 60-49 victory over La Salle Saturday night in the semifinals. That win improved the Wildcats' season record to 29-3 heading into next Saturday's championship game, at a time and site to be determined.

Junior guard Mya Pierfax led the way with 27 points, while junior forward Sydney Woodley finished with 17 points and 7 steals. The Wildcats raced out to a 10-0 lead, played solid defense and never looked back in recording the victory.

Coach Matt Dale said it was quite a contrast to the way his team started out its quarterfinal game against Whitney High of Cerritos three days earlier. In that game, Paloma Valley scored only 10 points in the first half before getting it together in the second half en route to a 48-27 victory.

"We're averaging 65 points a game," Dale said Sunday. "To score only 10 points in a half ... that resulted in a weird crisis of confidence for our players. But they came out strong in the second half and everything was fine.

"Last night we were really hitting. Mya hit a 3, Isabella (Villegas) hit a 3, and we had really good defensive possessions."

Dale recognized the irony of the championship match-up with Ontario Christian, which is 29-2 overall. Ontario Christian is the school that defeated the Wildcats girls volleyball team in the CIF finals the last two years.

"Somehow our schools keep running into each other," Dale said. "I talked to (Wildcats volleyball coach) Stephen Kaas at our game last night. I told him we'd try to get one against them and maybe have some revenge."