With nine lead changes and three ties through three quarters, Taylor Snaer and visiting East Union took a one-point lead to start the fourth quarter Thursday night at Sierra.
The Lancers were leading by 10 points late before a Sierra buzzer-beating 3-pointer by Emma Gilmore narrowed the gap to seven to give East Union a 57-50 win to for the start of the girls Valley Oak League season.
Snaer’s 33 points makes it the third night in a row she has scored 30 points or more.
“That’s a four-year varsity starter,” Lancers coach Jim Agostini said of Snaer. “Nobody works harder than her. She puts her own time in in the gym. And it pays off. You can see it. She is showing the way for the young kids with how we do things.
“She had three or four assists in that second half that were just dynamite. The execution of the offense in the second half — she was controlling it. She was scoring, she was passing. This is her third night in a row with more than 30 points. In all the years I have been here, we never had a player do that. She is just a special player, and special players make it easy on the coaches.”
At times, when the Timberwolves (0-1 VOL, 7-6 overall) were making a push, Snaer (four rebounds, four assists) would slam the door shut. She had an 8-2 run in the second quarter, a 6-0 run in the third and a 5-0 run late in the game.
“We had a couple of our starters on the bench due to foul trouble,” Snaer said. “So I tried to get open and my teammates got me the ball well. The other girls did well coming off the bench, and we did a good job getting rebounds.”
Snaer’s teammate Donnese Payne (eight points) was the game’s leading rebounder with 14.
“Getting rebounds is my job,” Payne said. “I practice rebounding hard and that’s kind of what I just do.
“It’s fun to get rebounds, and when they need me I’m there.”
Nylah Dyson added 10 points for East Union, with Ava Barrera chipping in six points and nine rebounds.
Gilmore led Sierra with 11 points and just missed a double-double with nine rebounds. Maci Carter added nine points and five rebounds and Taylor Zalunardo chipped in eight points. Alex Chapman added six points and 11 rebounds.
Timberwolves coach Rudy Valencia was quite impressed by Snaer.
“That girl Snaer is a heck of a ball player,” Valencia said. “She’s really good. It was kind of hard to get a hold of her and just kind of maintain her. She got wild and put it to us.
“Our girls played hard. They go to battle for each other and have good chemistry coming together. I’m very proud of the way they fought tonight.”
The Timberwolves travel to Weston Ranch tonight at 7:30, and Tuesday at 7 p.m. East Union hosts Central Catholic.
