Womens Basketball Team Dropped The Ball

Story By: Ashleigh Contreras, Reporter

March 20, 2024

Archive: Madison Johnson, #3, goes in for the layup against Madera City College.

Fresno City College’s women’s basketball team lost by four points against Laney College Eagles in the playoffs on Mar. 9, at the FCC gym.

The Rams had an impressive regular season, only losing four games prior to the postseason. They went into their home playoff game with an outstanding 25-4
record.

The energy was high. The crowd screamed as cut outs of player’s heads rose from the stands.

Coming into the game the Rams averaged almost 85 points a game and going 12-0 in their conference.

Hoping to go into this game dominating like the Rams had all season would prove to be anything but easy. Immediately, the Eagles proved they were here for a reason. They got out to a hot start against the stellar Rams.

With each passing quarter, the Rams tried keeping up but the Eagles had them right where they wanted them; going into halftime up 15 points with a score of 24 to 39.

As everyone walked around during half time, crowd members seemed pumped and held out hope for the team despite a disappointing first half.

During the third quarter, the Rams caught back up scoring 25 points, while the Eagles only scored 14. Their defense stepped up, frequently stealing the ball and
scoring, an impressive, eight 3-pointers.

They ended the third quarter with a score of 49 to 53. The Rams played defense well and were knocking on the Eagles front door as the lead was now in a few possessions.

The crowd was getting loud and standing on their feet, nervously hoping that the Rams would make a comeback to win the playoff game.

As the crowd was yelling aggressively, cheering on the Rams with their hopes high. The Rams were fighting hard to get ahead of the Eagles.

As the Rams continued to try to put on an amazing comeback, the crowd’s heads moved side to side to keep up.

The defense constantly blocked shots as the offense returned the favor by scoring.

As the time started to run out during the fourth quarter, the players started to get in the zone – hyperfocusing on the plays at hand. The game would be decided in the final minutes.

The Rams played a great game, but it wasn’t enough.

The Eagles played great offense, scoring a three, followed by an amazing defensive play by stealing the Ram’s ball. They would score another three, securing their victory against the Rams.

Eagles fans were on their feet as the Rams gave up these points in the last minutes of the game.

The great turnaround from the Eagles was only because of the sloppy play from the Rams.

They looked like,because of their stellar record, the win could be handed to them. Instead the team that prepared to play all four quarters came out on top.

Despite a tough loss, the Rams held their heads up as they congratulated the Eagles on a tough but depressing victory.

The Rams lost by four points, ending the game 62 to 66.

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About the Contributors

Ashleigh Contreras, Sports Editor

Ashleigh Contreras is a 22 year-old journalism major who was born in Clovis, CA and raised in Fresno, CA. After her senior year was cut short due to COVID, she wasn’t too sure on what she wanted to do after high school. She took a gap year before she decided to go to college. Once she got to college, she was studying studio arts till she realized she wanted to pursue her love for writing. The love and passion for writing grew when she decided to change her major to journalism. She wanted to expand her writing more. She loves reading and writing. Her favorite books are Turtles All the Way Down and Beautiful Boy and The Running Dream. She holds those books very close to her heart. One day, she hopes to write a book of her own. She loves watching movies, her favorite movies are 13 going on 30 and Moonlight and La La Land and Tick, Tick ... .BOOM! She also is a huge fan of Marvel. Her favorite Marvel movies are Andrew Garfield’s The Amazing Spider-man movies as well as Guardians of the Galaxy movies and Deadpool movies. She has probably watched all the Marvel movies about 100 times and the shows. A screenwriter and a director are something she dreams about becoming. Able to create something for people to watch means so much to her. She wants to be able to share something that means something to the world. Art can be anything you create, whether its writing or drawing. She wants to make people feel something with her art. One thing is cant live without is her earphones. She always has them while listening to music. She can't live without her music. Her favorite artists are Drake, Olivia Rodrigo, Miley Cyrus, Chappel Roan, Future, Reneé Rapp, Lorde, Sabrina Carpenter and Kanye West. Just to name a few. She listens to a lot of different genres. She’s a person with big dreams and goals. She’s the kind of person who wants it, she will go get it. She’s also very family-oriented. Everything she does is to make her family proud. She also just wants to make herself proud and happy. Putting yourself first is something she has always believed in. There is this one saying that Ashleigh reminds herself whenever she is in her head too much, “At the end of the day, all you got is yourself.”

Christianna Schiotis, Managing Editor

Christianna Schiotis is an 19-year-old who loves the color pink, dinosaurs, and Randy Marsh; paired with that she has childish humor and enjoys a good joke. She graduated in 2023 from Sanger High School with plenty of merit and awards. This is Schiotis’s third semester with the Rampage; this semester she is fulfilling the Managing Editor and Production Manager role. Her position as Managing Editor includes helping the Editor in Chief out wherever needed and learning leadership skills. As the Production Manager she oversees and helps with the design of the print. In her time at the Rampage, she has helped win numerous awards. She won two fourth place awards in the on the spot competitions: front page layout and copy editing test. The front page layout consisted of designing a front page from scratch and the copy editing was a 100 question AP style quiz that had to be done in under 30 minutes. She also helped win two first place plaques: one in social media and the other for an on site video competition. Both were a collaborative effort with other staff members. Schiotis took journalism classes for two of her high school years. In her first year, she was the Photo Editor. Also in her first year, she was in charge of her school's Arts and Literary magazine, which got tenth in the nation at NSPA’s journalism conference. For her Senior year, she was her high school’s newspaper's Editor in Chief, where she led a group of 23 students. During her time, she made her mark and her story got third in the nation. She will forever brag about it. She is also very thankful for the experience and the amazing staff she had. Schiotis also has her own pets who she spoils- her cats Mocha and Haly and puppy Azura. She loves to spend time with her best friend of nine years and her boyfriend of five years. She grew up in Fresno with her three siblings, all younger than her. She is going to do something in the journalism field, but doesn’t know what yet.

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Womens Basketball Team Dropped The Ball

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