Fighting for 4
American Heritage has eyes on their 4th straight title
American Heritage is one win away from joining an elite group of Florida girls basketball programs.
The Patriots cruised to a 66-29 win over Clearwater in the Class 5A state semifinals at the RP Funding Center in Lakeland on Thursday. If they beat Melbourne Palm Bay in the state title game on Saturday, Heritage will become only the sixth program in state history to win four consecutive state titles.
Heritage would become the third Broward County team to win four straight girls basketball championships.
“It feels good,” Patriots
coach Greg Farias said. “Like I always say — I said it last year and I said it a couple years ago — when I got to Heritage, girls basketball was the only team never to win a state title . ... I just feel blessed right now.”
American Heritage got out to a big lead early, outscoring Clearwater 14-4 in the first quarter and 23-8 in the second quarter. Junior guard Sydney Shaw led the Patriots with 20 points. Senior forward Tatyana Wyche added 14 points, and junior guard Joey Delancy had 10.
“Every game, it’s always been one or two different people,” Farias said. “[Taliyah Wyche] was in foul trouble the whole game. [Tatyana Wyche] gave us an amazing game. Syd, good job. Joey, mid-range. So it really [was] good.”
The Patriots’ defense dominated Clearwater. The
Tornadoes turned the ball over 27 times, and American Heritage scored 35 points off those turnovers.
“Once the playoffs started, I really buckled down in practice and the only thing we were working on was defense the whole time,” Farias said. “We’ve been here for a couple years. I know defense wins championships. We can struggle shooting like we did against Miami Norland, but our defense is what won it. Same thing here.”
American Heritage will play for its fourth state championship at 3 p.m. on Saturday. The Patriots will face Palm Bay, which beat St. Augustine on Thursday afternoon. MaxPreps ranks Palm Bay 12th in the state.
“It’s going to be really tough,” Farias said. “We have to play defense and play the way we played today.”