By Jim Richards
Turnabout was fair enough for sixth-seeded Goodyear Estrella Foothills on Saturday night.
Estrella Foothills avenged a first-round loss at state a year ago with a difficult 56-51 win over 11thseeded Holbrook in a rugged, tightly officiated and turnover-laden second-round contest of the Division III girls basketball tournament in front of a largely Holbrookfriendly crowd at Phoenix North Canyon High.
Esence Smith paced Estrella Foothills (23-5) with 18 points before fouling out late in the fourth quarter. She hadn’t forgotten last season’s 51-42 Holbrook victory in the opening round at Holbrook.
“This was huge revenge,” Smith said. “We’ve very happy about this one.”
Estrella Foothills, winner of 18 straight games, advanced to take on either No. 14 Monument Valley or No. 3 Tucson Pusch Ridge in quarterfinal play Tuesday at 1:30 p.m. at Tim’s Toyota Center in Prescott Valley.
Estrella Foothills let a nine-point fourth-quarter slip away but managed to hang on by hitting 11 of 21 free throws in the fourth quarter, to Holbrook’s 6 of13. For the game, Es- trella Foothills hit 18 of 37 foul shots to Holbrook’s 12 of 28. Both teams were in the bonus late in the third.
“We gave up the ball early,” Estrella Foothills coach Matthew Johnson said. “We wanted to be more patient. Our team speed was a little bit better than theirs. They got tired of guarding us toward the end, I think.”
Holbrook hit 7 of 23 3-point shots to Estrella’s 2 of 8.
Teyah Goldtooth, Holbrook’s top scorer with 16 before she also fouled out in the fourth quarter, hit consecutive 3s to keep Holbrook close at 8-7 early. Quanyyah Lester later scored off a fast break and later added a pair of free throws to lift Holbrook to a 14-10 lead after one quarter, a quarter in which Estrella Foothills turned the ball over eight times to Holbrook’s three.
Holbrook’s long-range success continued into the second quarter as Adriana Monroe connected for a 3 and Cheyenne Lester hit another for a a 25-23 lead with 2:15 to play in the half, but things turned drastically from there.
Estrella Foothills hit 9 of 10 shots from the field in the second and closed the quarter with a 9-0 run, as Catherine St. Vincent buried a 3 and Summer Olney came up with a steal and layup with two seconds remaining to lift Estrella Foothills to a 32- 25 lead at halftime.
Despite hitting just 2 of 6 shots from the floor and turning the ball over 10 times in the third quarter, Estrella Foothills managed to hold a 39-33 lead after three quarters, and after a Cheyenne Nabity inside basket, it held its biggest lead of the night, 41-33, early in the fourth.
Goldtooth again got hot, hitting a pair of 3s. Her second pulled Holbrook into a 41-41 tie. She then made a beautiful pass inside for Dena Kinlicheenie’s layup and a 43-41 Holbrook lead with 6:03 to play in the game.
Holbrook did not score again until Shandie Demuth’s lay-in with 2:19 to play in the game to cut Estrella’s lead to 51-48. St. Vincent hit a pair of free throws with 1:46 to play to lift Estrella to a 55-48 lead.
St. Vincent and Nabity had 10 points each for Estrella.