Future Huskies cap H.S. careers with state titles

Before Mikayla Coombs and Megan Walker embark on the quest of trying to lead the UConn women’s basketball program to more championships, they had some titles of their own to pursue.

Coombs, a 5-foot-9 guard, was up first on Friday as she led her Wesleyan School team back from a 17-point deficit to top rival Holy Innocents’ 51-48 in the Georgia 1A Private School title game.

Veteran Wesleyan coach Jan Azar, who earlier in the season won her 500th career game, gambled and put Coombs into the game with 5:22 left in the first half despite her star having two fouls. Coombs not only got to halftime without picking up a third foul, she had 10 points during a 12-2 run by the Lady Wolves to cut a 17-point lead to seven points by halftime. Coombs had five points in a span of 14 seconds in the third quarter to tie the game at 41. She would finish with 17 points, nine rebounds and two steals as Wesleyan won its 12th state title since 2002. It was the second state championship Coombs was a member of but a knee injury suffered in the season opener deprived her the chance to play in the title game when Wesleyan won the 2015 state title.

Coombs finished her senior year averaging 16.9 points, 7 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 4.1 steals per game. Coombs finishes her career seventh in Wesleyan program history in scoring (1,338 points), rebounding (642) and blocked shots (93) and eighth in steals (318) despite missing nearly all of her sophomore season.

Walker, a 6-foot-1 forward, had 18 of her 35 points in the fourth quarter including the gamewinning basket in the lane with 14 seconds left to lift Monacan to a 60-59 win over King’s Fork in the Virginia 4A title game. It was Monacan’s third straight 4A title.

Walker would finish with 35 points (going 15 of 24 from the foul line) to go with 11 rebounds, five steals and six blocked shots as Monacan finished the season at 30-0. Walker averaging 25.9 points, 7.6 rebounds and 3.2 steals per game as a senior. She finishes her career tied for 27th on the Virginia high school scoring list with 2,062 career points and also had 12 30-point games and 24 doubledoubles in her career. In three state championship games Walker averaged 25.7 points, 12.3 rebounds, 3.7 steals and 3.3 blocked shots.

Coombs and Walker will be teammates on the East team in the Mar. 29 McDonald’s All-American Game being played in Chicago. They will also be on the West squad for the Jordan Brand Classic being played on Apr. 14 at the Barclays Center in New York.