Colony girls score OT win over Ketchikan

KETCHIKAN — It certainly felt like it was the longest night of the year at the Clarke Cochrane gymnasium Saturday.

After building a 16-point third-quarter lead, the clock couldn’t tick down fast enough for the Kayhi girls as Colony scratched and clawed its way back into the game before eventually claiming a thrilling 57-53 overtime victory.

Colony tied the game on a banked-in 3-point basket by senior Izzy Tweed in the closing seconds, then scored the first four and last four points of overtime to pull out a tough road victory on the night of the winter solstice.

“I got a screen and got the pass from (Sarah) Brumbaugh, and I just threw it up,” Tweed said. “I was lucky that it went in. The only thing on my mind was that the game was not over yet.”

The sharp-shooting Tweed struggled with her shooting in pregame warmups and throughout the first half of Saturday’s contest, but she warmed up in the second half, hitting four field goals, including a pair of 3-pointers in the final two minutes of play. Her game-tying shot had a bit of luck on its side, but the Knights fought hard to put themselves in a position to benefit from the good fortune. “In the shootaround she said, ‘Coach my shot is like pooh,’” Colony coach Jeff Bowker said. “But I will take her shooting in that situation every time. I’ve coached Izzy for three years, and I’ve drawn a lot of plays for her at the end of games. That’s the first one that has gone in, but I always trust her to have the guts to take that shot.”

After Tweed’s game-tying 3, Kayhi senior Jayley Taylor missed on a hurried drive to the basket and Tweed got off one more deep 3-point attempt that was long at the buzzer. The end of regulation didn’t bring an end to the string of clutch plays by both teams. Colony scored the first four points of overtime, and the Lady Kings missed four free throws in the first half of overtime, but Kayhi battled back on a beautiful inside move by sophomore Eliah Anderson, followed by a driving layup from sophomore Alexis Biggerstaff that got the hometown crowd on its feet.

Biggerstaff fouled out diving for the ball in the backcourt, and Colony appeared to regain control of the contest, building a 54-50 advantage after a pair of free throws by Tweed with 28.8 seconds to play. But in overtime it was the Lady Kings that wouldn’t go away. AJ Dela Cruz swished a 3-pointer from the right corner to cut the lead to 54-53, prompting the Kayhi student section to begin chanting, “She’s a freshman. She’s a freshman.”

The final bounces didn’t go the Lady Kings way, however, as a chance for victory literally went off their fingertips. Colony junior Sarah Brumbaugh was fouled and missed a pair of free throws with 8.9 seconds remaining, keeping the lead at a single point, but the Lady Kings were unable to corral the rebound.

It bounced between a pair of Kayhi players and out of bounds. Another quick foul sent Tweed to the line with 4 seconds remaining. Tweed hit the first free throw to make the score 55-53. She missed the second, but again the ball bounced out of bounds of the Lady Kings. Colony junior Sarah Bonn finally sank a pair of free throws with 1.2 seconds on the clock to give the Knights an intense 57-53 victory. The Lady Kings led 24-8 early in the third quarter before Colony turned up the defensive pressure and began to get in rhythm on offense. Colony cut the Kayhi lead to five points on a handful of occasions, but it still looked like the Lady Kings were going to be able to weather the storm when Biggerstaff got a kind bounce on a 3-pointer from the left corner that put the Lady Kings up 39-31 with 2:51 remaining. A 3-pointer by Tweed and an inside bucket by Jennifer Solano cut the lead to 42-39. After a short bank shot by Anderson put Kayhi back up by five, Colony hit a pair of free throws to cut the lead to three again. On the ensuing possession, the Knights were attempting to foul when Kayhi turned the ball over, setting up Tweed’s game-tying shot.

“We gave this one away,” Kayhi coach Kelly Smith said. “I don’t want to take anything away from Colony. They are a high-ranked team for a reason, but we had them not playing well, and we had numerous chances to put the game away.”

The Lady Kings broke the Colony press several times in the third quarter, but missed three layups at the end of press breaks, failing to build on their big lead and giving the Knights a chance to fight back.

“We let them crawl back into the game,” Smith said. “You could feel the confidence level growing the closer they got.”

In the first half, it was the Lady Kings that displayed extreme confidence. Playing inspired defense, the Lady Kings held Colony to eight first-half points, with two of the buckets coming on breakdowns by the back end of the Kayhi press.

“It should’ve been 24-4,” Smith said.

On offense, Biggerstaff did most of the work, scoring 10 first-half points as Kayhi built a 21-8 halftime lead. When Anderson sank a 3-point early in the second half, the Lady Kings led by 16 and appeared well on their way to an impressive victory. Then Colony turned up the pace of the game, pressing defensively and moving the ball quicker on offense. The Knights began to knock down open shots, drawing the Lady Kings out of their zone defense. “We just had to change the pace somehow,” Bowker said. “You know the old phrase that you can’t keep doing the same thing and expect a different result. It was definitely a team win for us. Players made plays.”

“They started figuring us out and getting good looks,” Smith said. “We changed to a man (defense), but by that time they had found a rhythm.” It was a frustrating end to a tough season-opening five game stretch for the Lady Kings. Kayhi played three teams expected to be in the top five in the state and won two of five games. After losing a pair of 20-point contests at West Anchorage, the Lady Kings earned a huge road win at Wasilla before splitting a pair of games with Colony. Friday night’s 45-42 win over Colony was an endowment game and doesn’t count on Kayhi’s record, so the Lady Kings are officially 1-3, but have shown they are one of the more talented teams in the state.

“This just shows how close we are to being right there with the state’s best,” Smith said. “If we are going to be a winning team, those are the situations we have to learn from. I told our team that this is a shame, only if we don’t learn from it.

“But that doesn’t help how we feel right now. It’s frustrating. I think we all, players and coaches, feel like there were things we could’ve done differently to win this game.”

Biggerstaff led the Lady Kings with 16 points. Anderson added 14, including 12 in the second half and overtime. Taylor scored 12 points, going 8 of 14 from the free-throw line. Kayhi hit 18 of 33 free throws, including only 2 of 6 in overtime. Biggerstaff, Kemble and Brooke Simmons all fouled out of the game in overtime.

Tweed led Colony with 16 points, including 13 in the second half and overtime. Solano scored all 15 of her points in the second half. Sarah Bonn added 10 points and Chase Stephens scored eight. Colony was 18 of 27 from the free-throw line, including 9 of 13 in overtime.