The Soldotna girls hoops squad defeated El Cajon Valley High School 50-15 Tuesday at the So Cal Holiday Prep Classic in San Diego, but it still wasn’t enough to play in the championship game.

The Stars completed the round-robin portion of the tournament in a three-way tie for first in their group with a 2-1 record, all against schools with a much bigger student population, but lost out on the chance to play for the championship on a defensive tiebreaker, giving up 101 points over the three games to lose out on the 98 points given up by Fullerton Union (California). Soldotna beat Fullerton 42-39 on the first day of the tournament Saturday.

SoHi will face Campo Verde (Arizona) at 11:30 a.m. AST.

Against El Cajon Valley — a school of about 1,700 — SoHi hit seven 3’s, a night which Stars coach Kyle McFall said was the team’s best shooting performance of the season. McFall praised the efforts of sophomore Melia Miller and senior Daisy Nelson.

The Nikiski boys lost 60-54 to Konawaena High School, Tuesday at the WYBT Makahiki Hou Invitational in Kona, Hawaii

The Bulldogs trailed 32-27 at halftime, but were outscored 13-7 in the third quarter, and could not make up the deficit.

Nathan Carstens tallied four triples to end up with 14 points for Nikiski, while Luke Johnson notched 10 points.

The Kenai Central girls hoops team was handed a 54-24 loss by Chugiak, Monday at the Capital City Classic tournament in Juneau.

The Mustangs were led by Ayanna Tippins, who scored 16 points.

Tuesday’s Kenai and Juneau game score was not available when the Clarion went to press.