For many freshmen looking to break into their high school basketball programs, a year or two in the lower levels is needed to acclimate to the rigors and tempo of the game.  That isn’t the case for Valencia High School freshman Kamilla Basyrova.  A starter for head coach Jared Honig since the Vikings’ first game of the season, Basyrova is currently second on the team in points per game with 19, just behind junior Cara McKell’s 20.1. It’s an impressive start for a player who Honig asked to be the team’s point guard despite Basyrova playing as a wing on other teams.  “We kind of ask a lot of the point guard in terms of the pace and the flow and getting us into offensive sets and understanding when it’s your time to shoot, when it’s your time to give the ball up,” Honig said. “So, just learning all that on top of doing what she’s accustomed to doing has been pretty impressive.”  Basyrova put up possibly her best performance yet in a Valencia jersey last week, setting the program’s single-game scoring record with 40 points in a loss to St. Joseph in the semifinals of the Gold bracket of the Santa Barbara Tournament of Champions. She hit six 3-pointers on her way to that mark and made six of seven free throws.  But Basyrova was so immersed in trying to lift her team to victory that she didn’t realize just how special of a game she was having.  “I didn’t know how many I had, but I knew that my shot was going in,” Basyrova said.  Valencia High School freshman Kamilla Basyrova (left), pictured with head coach Jared Honig, set the girls’ basketball programs’ single-game scoring record with 40 points. Tyler Wainfeld/The Signal. Honig said the Vikings were up by 16 at one point before St. Jospeh roared back. The two teams battled back and forth the rest of the way only for the Vikings to come up just short.  Basyrova wasn’t the only Viking to have a career game that day. McKell’s 30 points in the loss was her career high as well.  “I think both Kamilla and Cara were both playing in the flow of the game,” Honig said. “I mean, they really have that like inside-out tandem. Kara really likes to get to the basket and be a bruiser, and Kamilla was really lighting it up (from outside) … I know (McKell has) really been wanting that 30, because she got 29 I think maybe twice last year. So hitting that 30, it was kind of overshadowed by Kamilla’s 40, but I think for our team and for her, that’s a pretty big thing that I think should stand out as well.”  The scoring duo was back at it the next night to help Valencia to a third-place finish at the tournament. The Vikings defeated Bakersfield Christian, 68-60, led by Basyrova’s 26 points and four assists and McKell’s 15 points and four assists.  “It was really good because we came back stronger, and we knew that we had to win that game,” Basyrova said.  Defeating Bakersfield was no small task, Honig said, as the Eagles were coming off last season’s run to the CIF Division III state tournament and multiple players were in foul trouble.  “Second half, we played a really impressive game,” Honig said. “Kara was in foul trouble, Alexis (Epie) was in foul trouble, but still just did enough to pull through. It was a really whole-team effort to win that game.”  At 11-2 overall and 3-1 in the Foothill League — the lone league loss came at the hands of the Hart Hawks, who have won at least a share of the last two league titles and are on a 16-game league winning streak — the Vikings are looking like a team that can compete now despite Honig relying on a host of young players.  McKell is the veteran presence as a junior and recently joined the 1,000-point club, but the next three leading scorers are all freshmen or sophomores. Coming in behind Basyrova at No. 3 is sophomore Keira McLaughlin with 7.7 points per game, just ahead of Epie, a freshman, at 7.1 points per game.  Honig said there’s a chance the latter three can all join McKell in reaching that scoring mark in the future — possibly sooner than later — as he is reminded of what the Valencia program looked like when he was starting out as a coach at Granada Hills High School about a decade ago.  “It kind of reminds me of when I started coaching at Granada all those years ago, the Valencia team that was here with you Kenadee Honaker and Kayla Konrad and that group,” Honig said. “They had like four or five really strong players, kind of put the program at a different level. So, they have a cool opportunity to kind of bring it back to where it used to be.”  The post Valencia freshman Kamilla Basyrova sets program scoring record  appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.