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Despite some sloppy play and a short bench, the Berkeley High girls’ basketball team easily beat Encinal, 64-43, in a preview of next weekend’s ACCAL championship game. 

Senior Kalyca Seabrook led the ’Jackets with 15 points, also racking up 6 rebounds and 3 steals. Classmates Sabrina Keys and Angelita Hutton were also in the spirit of Senior Night, scoring 13 and 10 points, respectively. 

Encinal, which has already clinched the ACCAL regular season title, will face Berkeley next Saturday for the league’s automatic North Coast Section playoff bid. The ’Jackets (17-7) were given “competitive anomaly” status before the season, allowing them to face each ACCAL team just once rather than the usual home-and-home series, with their games not counting in the league standings. The ’Jackets are essentially an independent team, much like the football team at De La Salle High. But they will still get a shot at the league’s automatic NCS bid after each season. 

After four minutes of play, the outcome of the game was nearly certain. The Jets spotted Berkeley a 10-0 lead, committing five turnovers before getting on the scoreboard with a Marquita Price 3-pointer. That was the only basket they would score in the opening quarter, with Berkeley senior Myette Anderson giving her team a 14-3 lead with a putback at the buzzer. 

Berkeley started to relax in the second quarter, and the Jets showed some firepower with 16 points in the quarter and went into the locker room with a 26-19 deficit despite shooting just 20 percent from the floor. It helped that the ’Jackets weren’t much better at 36 percent. 

“I was a little upset with the defense we weren’t playing in the first half,” Berkeley head coach Gene Nakamura said. “They weren’t driving and they had no inside game, but we were letting them shoot unguarded from the outside.” 

Encinal actually managed to cut the Berkeley lead to three points early in the third quarter, but the ’Jackets immediately woke up and put together a 10-2 run. Although Encinal’s Shafon Rollins hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer, Berkeley had built a 47-33 lead that wouldn’t get any smaller in the fourth quarter. 

The Jets (18-7, 9-0 ACCAL) made their defensive strategy clear: don’t let Sabrina Keys beat you inside. The Purdue-bound forward was double- or triple-teamed nearly every time she touched the ball, and eventually resorted to heading outside for jumpers. She showed unexpected range, hitting two 3-pointers in the second half, and still managed to pull down 12 rebounds and deal out 4 assists. 

“I was getting triple-teamed all night. I didn’t have any choice but to pass or shoot from where I was,” Keys said. “But we’ll have Devanei (Hampton) back for the next game, so I’ll have more help down there.” 

Hampton,a 6-foot-3 freshman, has been out for three weeks with a knee injury. She had an MRI and has been cleared to practice later this week, but Nakamura isn’t counting on an immediate impact. 

“She’s been off her feet for three weeks. Who knows what kind of shape she’ll be in,” he said. “We’ll play with who we have at the time.” 

Nakamura’s squad, usually packed to the limit, is getting thin these days. He suited up just 10 players against Encinal, after having just eight players available for a game last week. Two players have been lost to grades, and another left the team because of scheduling conflicts. 

Encinal head coach Tanda Rucker, who played at Berkeley High in the early 1990s, said her team isn’t intimidated by Berkeley’s tradition. But she knows her team has a lot of work to do if they are to give the ’Jackets a better game next Saturday. 

“Their defensive pressure forced us into a up-tempo game, which isn’t our strength,” Rucker said. “We need to take care of the ball, and we need to box out on the inside to offset their height advantage.” 

With a spot in the postseason on the line and Hampton back in the middle, Encinal may need more than a better strategy to beat Rucker’s alma mater. 

“I feel like we’re already in the playoffs,” Keys said. “We just have to get comfortable with each other and play better than we did tonight.”