Dominant closing run lifts Holy Family into state title game
No first- quarter points, no problem for Holy Family in Thursday’s Class 4A girls semifinal.
The Tigers started their afternoon at the Denver Coliseum with 8 minutes, 31 seconds of scoreless basketball, but finished it off by securing a spot in Saturday’s state championship game with a 31-20 victory over Lutheran.
How did they do it? An intense defensive effort, a double- double from standout post Fiona Snashall and a dominant closing run that turned a back-and-forth, low- scoring contest into a doubledigit victory.
“It was the lowest- scoring game for both teams, so it was definitely nervewracking, but I think our will to win showed through in the third and fourth quarters,” Snahsall said after scoring eight of her 10 points in the second half and collecting a game- best 12 rebounds. “The nerves kind of settled down and we said, ‘ OK, we really want this.’”
The teams traded leads early in the closing frame. Holy Family guard Essynce Contreraz (eight points) stole the ball out high and raced the other way for a layup and a 1917 lead only to have Lutheran standout Raelyn Kelly (game-best 16 points) knock down a 3-pointer to put her team back on top, 20-19.
Holy Family guard Julia Hodell, beset by foul trouble early in the game and scoreless for the first 28 minutes, picked a good time for her first basket. She hit an open 3-pointer from the top of the key to give her team a 22-20 lead and kick off a closing 12- 0 run over the final four minutes.
“When she shot that three, I knew it was going in,” Snashall said. “It was the big push of energy we needed.”
“She hit that three and our hearts just got big,” Holy Family coach Ron Rossi said. “We weren’t going to be denied at that point.”
The emphatic finish made a scoreless first quarter, to say nothing of a 43-31 loss to Lutheran on Jan. 30, feel like the distant past.
“The first time we played them, it was a blowout and they completely killed us,” Snashall said. “They’re a really great team and a great program, so we all knew exactly how it was going to be going into it. Then from there, after the third quarter, it just showed who wanted it more.”
Rossi’s team stayed in the game despite an 0- of10 start from the floor by locking down on the defensive end and holding Lutheran to two firstquarter points.
“I just believe in our kids because we believe in our defense,” said Rossi, whose team had nudged to an 11-10 lead by halftime. “We’re a really good defensive club. A different style than most people, but we played really good and really hard.”
Now they’ll take on D’evelyn for a state title game on Saturday. Holy Family’s been to the Final Four four of the past five years but had to settle for a co-title in 2020 when the start of the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out the championship game.
“To know that we’ve come this far with all the struggles with covid and then losing last year to Green Mountain, this means a lot,” Contreraz said. … “To come in, make this our own state tournament run, it’s going to be fun. We’re so excited. We made it this far, now we’ve got to finish it.”
NO. 2 D’EVELYN 49, NO. 3 UNIVERSITY 44>>
With D’evelyn’s perfect season hanging in the balance in the waning minutes of Thursday morning’s Final 4 opener, the Jaguars turned to a steady hand: Macy Scheer.
And just as she had early on in helping D’evelyn build a five-point halftime lead, the junior forward came through, burying a 3-pointer from the wing with 1:45 left that helped stave off a never- say- die Bulldogs (24- 3) team to advance to the championship round for the first time in 10 years.
One more win, and the Jaguars (27- 0) will not only be state champions, but undefeated state champions.
“We’re just so excited, and we just want to take it all home,” Scheer said.
Scheer f inished the game with 12 points and four assists on 5- of-10 shooting, with three of her dimes finding scoring leader Peyton Marvel (21 points, eight rebounds) for lay-ins in a first half the Jaguars controlled. Her last assist came near the end of the third quarter, when she found a soft spot in the University zone and swung the ball to a wide open Ingrid Dalla for a 3-pointer that gave the Jags a 37-29 edge going into the fourth.
The D’evelyn offense dried up after that, with University senior guard Taryn Kravig (15 points) and sophomore post Addison Harding (12 points, six rebounds) punching back like they had the entire game.
The duo made it a single-possession game three times in the final two minutes. The first was a Harding basket in the post that was immediately answered by Scheer’s 3 rattling home on the other end. The last came on a Kravig drive with 45.5 seconds to go, but the Jaguars made just enough free throws after that (4 of 6) to hang on.
“In coaching, that’s called a ‘no, no, yes,’ shot,” D’evelyn coach Chris Olson joked about Scheer’s 3.