During much of the 1960s and 70s there was a high school in East Palo Alto, Ravenswood, that was plenty tough in basketball.
Now there's another school that's pretty stellar itself, Eastside College Prep. Tuesday night behind 22 points and 12 rebounds from Hashima Carothers, Eastside defeated Pinewood 47-34 in an important West Bay-Foothill game.
The victory clinched at least a tie for the league title for Eastside (17-5, 8-1) and drops Pinewood (18-5, 7-2) into second place.
The University of San Francisco-bound Carothers was a force for Eastside with her aggressive rebounding and dead-eye shooting.
"She's a special athlete," Eastside coach Donovan Blythe said. "She's not even playing to her full potential yet. When she does at the college level, she'll be scary. She's so quick. When we first got her four years ago she was just a post player, but now she can hit from 15 and 17 feet out."
Eastside had bolted to a 24-12 lead following a lay-in by point guard Charmaine Bradford (14 points) with 1:08 left in the first half. But Pinewood bounced back with 3-pointers by Marissa Hing and Angelina Mapa to trail 24-18 at the break.
Eastside extended the lead to 34-23 late in the third quarter when Carothers showed her defensive skill, picking a Pinewood ball-handler clean and gliding in for a lay-in. She was also fouled and made the free throw and Eastside's lead was 14. It wouldn't be caught.
"I'm just happy," the 6-foot Carothers said. "We worked so hard for this game and it's a relief to win it."
On the opposite side Hing scored eight points and also took six first-half rebounds, despite her diminutive stature. But nobody besides Mapa scored in double figures for Pinewood which had a difficult time matching Eastside's athleticism and teamwork.
"There are three aspects to winning," Pinewood coach Doc Scheppler said. "Athleticism, intensity and good principles. They have the athleticism and intensity and their principles are good. They don't have a lot of depth and that allowed us to make a run and score some backdoor baskets, but then we became fatigued too."
Destiny Graham (11 rebounds) and Alexis Simon (eight rebounds) backed Carothers nicely, helping Eastside control the boards.
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John Murphy can be reached at jmurphy@prep2prep.com
