After the dusts settles on the Area Tournament, the two remaining Cherokee County basketball teams are headed to the State Tournament.
The Sequoyah and Keys girls basketball programs are set for the 3A State Tournament. Both teams vanquished familiar foes to earn spots at Oklahoma City.
Freshman leads SHS
A big game from a young player was key in the Sequoyah girls basketball team’s earning a spot in the State Tournament.
Freshman Brenly Lamb’s 16 points led the Lady Indians to a 46-40 win over the Roland Lady Rangers Friday, March 7, in Seminole. Lamb hit three 3-pointers to help punch the Lady Indians’ ticket to the State Championship. This marks the first time in five years the Lady Indians have made State.
“She is a freshman, and to play a game like that is huge. She scored well but she guarded better than she had all year long,” SHS coach Justin Brown said.
Having a roster where underclassmen can get points has been critical to the Lady Indians’ success this season.
“It feels really good and it helps when my team is cheering me on. I think we will have some big games at the State Tournament,” Lamb said.
Coming out early, the Lady Indians got the nerves worked out by taking an early first-quarter lead. RHS took the initial lead, but the Lady Indians rattled off a 7-0 run to pull ahead 7-2.
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Sequoyah’s Prairie Holmes goes for a layup in the Area Championship.
SHS built that lead up to 13-7 by the end of the first quarter. The Lady Indians had five players score in the first quarter, their most in any quarter vs. RHS.
“It is always good; in games like this, nerves are big. To hit some shots early was important for us,” Brown said.
Going into halftime, SHS held a slight lead but lost it in the early minutes of the third quarter. That proved to be a battle. as SHS picked up just 5 points and was down 34-32 headed into the fourth quarter.
On the first possession in the fourth, the Lady Indians tied the game up, before a Lamb 2-pointer gave SHS the lead again.
“Locking up on defense, we had good movement all game, but we had some breakdowns, so we’re just fixing our mistakes on defense,” SHS senior Rylee Bush said.
Keys win big over MHS
The Lady Cougars lead wire to wire clinching their place in the state tournament with a big victory over Morris 48-22 at Verdigris.
The Keys’ defense came up huge in the second half limiting Morris to only 9 second-half points. After the halftime break, Keys outscored Morris 30-9, while shooting nearly perfect from the free-throw line and going 19/20 in the second half.
“Our kids played hard, executed our scouting report, stayed locked in, played together and played with confidence. I felt really good with how we competed, and it’s exciting,” Keys coach Kruz Lynch said. “It’s every one of these kids’ first trip to the state tournament, and hopefully, we can keep the momentum rolling and win a couple of games.”
Things were scoreless for nearly the first three minutes of the second quarter; a free throw from Kenlee Comer made it a two-score game again. Keys didn’t allow a score for the first half of the quarter, but back-to-back scoring possessions for Morris made it a 15-11 game with 3:05 until halftime.
Senior Elizabeth Holland led the way, scoring for Keys in the first half and almost outscoring Morris by herself, racking up 11 points in the first half.
zodrows
Payton Zodrow (3) and Paizlee Zodrow (2) defend together vs. Adair. The two exchange a dribble handoff vs. Morris.
“We’ve struggled at times offensively all year. It’s something I always talk about; why aren’t we hitting shots? We told them that this is your strength, you play defense well, you defend well. We got really good pieces, so we can mix it up and do a lot of things,” Lynch said. “Tonight that was our thing before the game: Come in here, take care of stops, take care of rebounds, and if we don’t shoot the ball great, oh well, let’s just make things hard defensively and keep them from scoring too many points.”
After Morris reached the bonus, Keys followed suit, reaching that mark on the next possession.
Unlike Morris, the Lady Cougars capitalized on their free-throw opportunities, going 15 of 18 in the fourth quarter from the line. The strong free-throw shooting from Keys helped them hang on for the 48-22 win.
KHS opens the tournament Thursday, March 13, against Alva and will play the winner of Roland and Washington.
SHS plays right after Keys at 7:30 p.m. facing off with Anadarko. If they win, they play the winners of Adair and Community Christian.
