LINCOLN, Calif. – Junior Laila Mendoza connected on 10 of 15 from the floor en route to a career-high 20 points as St. Francis rode a 28-0 start to a 61-21 win over Center in the first round of the Lincoln Invitational girls' basketball tournament at Dale Pence Gymnasium Friday night. The victory followed an equally dominant 32-12 for the Troubadours' junior varsity against the host Zebras earlier in the session.

The SF varsity squad improves to 6-4 for the year while the jayvees move to 5-4 overall.

Mendoza recorded her sixth game of the year with double-digit offense, and surpassed her previous best of 13 from the 2024-25 season opener at Vista Del Lago. Junior Lexi London added 11 points with seven rebounds and six of her team's 21 steals, while sophomore Audrey Bashore matched those 11 points while contributing five boards.

Senior Sydney Teoh narrowly missed giving the Troubies a fourth player in double figures, coming off the bench to provide nine points, five rebounds and four steals. She also matched fellow senior Karly Okamoto for the team lead of five assists.

London opened the game with a block against CHS sophomore Kailee Coggins then proceeded to score seven in St. Francis' 17-0 first period. Bashore also hit three field goals in the opener, then made back-to-back buckets to cap the run of 28 unanswered midway through the second half. Coggins appeared to have broken the scoreless streak for the Cougars, but a foul was ruled on the floor, erasing a would-be basket plus the and-one opportunity. Instead, it was freshman Jayda Sagun and her corner three that ended the drought.

Still, the Troubies held Center to just one more score down the stretch of the first half, carrying a 35-5 lead into the break. The Cougars drained two more treys early in the third to reduce the gap to 39-13 by the 4:30 mark, but Mendoza countered with consecutive scores on Teoh assists: a midrange jumper in the paint with 4:11 left and a fast break initiated by a London steal with 3:38 to go.

St. Francis extended its lead to 37 points at 53-16 for the remainder of the third, exclusively on fast breaks. Mendoza extended the advantage to 57-16 on back-to-back putbacks in the fourth, the latter of which invoked the running clock and expedited the home stretch.

Mendoza, Bashore and Okamoto chipped in three steals apiece, with sophomore Natalia Zitelli adding two to go with her career-best six points.

Earlier in the day, St. Francis' JV enjoyed a similar defensive performance against host Lincoln, with Jocelyn Dickinson leading the offense with 15 points on 7-for-11 shooting. The Troubies held the Zebras to a single free throw in an 11-1 first half, and did not surrender a field goal until Lisa Mauricio connected just 54 seconds after the intermission.

However, that first Lincoln bucket also sent freshman Catherine Gustafson hobbling from the game, leaving SF with just four players for the final 15 minutes of action. Dickinson scored three straight to extend the lead to 18-3: a pull-up jumper at the 5:28 mark, a fast break at 5:07 and a drive through the lane at 2:39. Jocelyn Villaflor then drew a shooting foul and made both of her free throws to make it 20-3. Lincoln managed to get two scores back in the final two minutes to reduce to margin to 13.

Still, the short-handed Troubie jayvees managed to stretch their lead in the fourth, thanks in huge part to a pair of three-pointers from Emmy Cheatham as part of an overall 8-0 run. Dickinson converted a pass from Lena Mundhenk as part of that stretch, then she and Villaflor exchanged Jocelyn-to-Jocelyn scores across the final 2:10 of play.

Each St. Francis team advances to its respective semifinal. The JV will play former Delta League foe Sheldon in the 2 p.m. contest while the varsity takes on Kennedy at 6:30 p.m. Due to the happenstance of where the holidays fell in the 2024 calendar,  Lincoln Invitational runs through the weekend with semifinals on Saturday and finals on Monday.