For Audrey Yutronich, Her 16th Is Doubly Sweet

Palos Verdes High sophomore Audrey Yutronich celebrated her 16^th birthday in grand style Tuesday night and gave Peninsula a surprise all at the same time.

Taking advantage of a defense that was determined to keep the ball out of 6-foot-1 junior Kelsey Brockway’s hands early on, Yutronich sank five 3-points shots in the first half and finished with six 3-pointers for all of her 18 points in the Sea Kings' 74-61 victory.

Yutronich’s sister, Victoria, had a big hand in making the birthday such a smash success. The junior point guard scored 14 points and handed out 15 assists.           

“My job is to shoot when I’m open,” Audrey Yutronich said a bit shyly. “My sister’s good at pointing out where I need to go to get open and then she’s good at getting me the ball.”

Victoria Yutronich enjoyed her sister’s performance almost as much as she did another strong victory in the Bay League for Palos Verdes, which is now 10-8 overall and 3-0 in league.

“Yeah, I was really proud of her,” she said. “I try to set her up when I can. It was really fun to see her shoot like that tonight.”

Audrey Yutronich and Megan Takahashi did much of the scoring in a 35-29 first half. The Sea Kings really took control, though, when Brockway and Victoria Yutronich started to assert themselves in the second half.

Brockway scored 17 points in the second half and finished with 23 points, 17 rebounds and several blocks. Yutronich scored 12 of her 14 points in the second half.

“Our game plan was to go inside to Kelsey, but we shot the ball so well in the first half we didn’t really have to,” Coach Andy Furuto said. “That was a nice surprise. It got us going right away.

“Kelsey’s very unselfish, so everything went smoothly. When we started to get it to her in the second half, she responded.”

Peninsula fell to 10-9 overall and 1-2 in the Bay League despite a gritty 19-point performance by guard Stephanie Wong. The undersized Panthers also got 10 points apiece from sophomore guard Noelani Emnace and guard Shelby Tsukamoto, and never stopped competing, even when they fell behind by 20 points (57-37) late in the third quarter.

The Panthers got as close as  71-61 after Wong’s fifth 3-pointer, but Brockway’s short jumper stopped the rally and clinched the victory in the final minute.

“It’s always great to win against Pen, because they’re so scrappy,” Brockway said. “You’ve got to come out strong against them, and then you have to stay ready because they can come back on you with their 3-point shooting.”

The game changed in the second half, Brockway said, when she began looking for the open spots and the team began playing stronger defense. The Panthers scored just eight points in the third quarter, including only two during a 20-point surge by the Sea Kings.

“The whole team picked it up,” Brockway said. “The coach told me to look for the spots and things started to fall into place.”

Peninsula’s early defensive strategy might have worked had it not been for the 3-point shooting of Yutronich and Takahashi.

“We did try to make it hard on her,” Peninsula coach Natalie Kelly said. “She’s going to get her points and rebounds. It worked early, but then they had all those 3-point shots.”

The Sea Kings used three 3-pointers to jump out to an 11-2 lead before Wong sparked a rally that made it 17-13 entering the second quarter.

A 3-point shot by Yutronich hiked the lead to 26-16 in the second quarter, but Wong hit two 3-pointers later in the quarter to make it 35-29 at halftime.

Three-pointers by Shannon Tsumaki and Hannah Bruno cut PV’s lead to 37-35, but then the game changed dramatically. The Panthers cooled off and Brockway took over, scoring nine points to spark a 20-2 run that made it 57-37 entering the fourth quarter.

“I thought we played very well,” Furuto said. “We’re playing like I hoped we would. We’re 3-0 in league and next up is Redondo (also 3-0). That’s a big one.”