Sunday, March 14, 2010
COLUMBIA -- The Incarnate Word Academy basketball team went to Columbia with the goal of bringing a state championship back to St. Louis, and that's exactly what they did.
Incarnate Word defeated Blue Springs 52-43 Saturday night to claim the Class 5A state title.
The Oakville boys team was not as successful, losing its bid for a state title in the finals of the Class 5A boys division by a 54-49 margin to Springfield Hillcrest.
Another St. Louis prep team, CBC, brought home a third-place trophy after being Park Hill of Kansas City 51-43. The two other two St. Louis to qualify for the Final Four, Borgia and St. Dominic, both finished fourth.
It was a near perfect year for the 30-1 Incarnate Word Red Knights. The only loss was a narrow 52-49 setback to Whitney Young of Chicago, a nationally ranked team.
Dan Rolfes personally captured his second title, the first coming in 2006. This is IWA’s third state basketball championship. On a night when college bound point guard Chloe Nelson (Illinois State) and Jazmin Hitchens (Ball State) struggled, Brittany Carter, Brianna Puni and Julia Kohnen stepped forward and delivered. Puni paced the Red Knights with 14 points and 10 rebounds and Carter added 12 points.
Rolfes revealed when IWA lost in the championship game two years ago his two Division I bound seniors (Nelson and Hitchens) vowed it would be championship and nothing less. “They worked incredibly hard to earn this. There was no way were going to lose,” said Rolfes.
IWA trailed at halftime in the playoffs just two times this year, the district championship with St. Joseph’s Academy and the title game with Blue Springs.
“We really didn’t have to make a lot of adjustments. We just went back to re-enforcing our game plan and sticking with it. Our goal was stopping their dribble penetration and not allowing a lot of offensive rebounds,” said Rolfes.
The name to remember from Oakville's title loss is Dorial Green. He is a 15-year-old sophomore at Hillcrest, who already is 6-foot-5, 230 pounds who has both college football and basketball recruiters drooling. So far, USC, Florida, Texas, Missouri and a bunch of others are in the chase for this talented wide receiver. Against Oakville, he and Trey Starks were a two-man wrecking crew.
Green, a defensive brut scored 21 points, had 13 rebounds; blocked six shots and altered at least another half dozen. He scored six points in the last minute of play. Until then, Oakville had a six-point lead with 4 minutes, 36 seconds left in regulation play. Senior guard Starks had a game-high 22 points, connection of six of 15 field goal attempts. Once suspended from the team, the Hornets were 12-0 upon his return to the lineup.
“There were just a couple of things we didn’t get done coming down the stretch. That hurt us,” said Oakville coach Nick Traxler. That (Dorial) Green is big and strong, and just hard to handle. It was a tough loss for our boys. We had won 17 in a row, and they weren’t used to losing. However, it was still a great year for our boys and our community,” said Traxler.
The CBC Cadebts finished the year 23-9 after losing their chance at the state title in an overtime loss to Oakville in the semifinals.
“We shot 50 percent from the field. We got a lot of people involved. Everyone of our players got out onto the floor and they will have that memory of the state tournament,” said the Cadet’s coach Bob McCormack. His two graduating seniors Ryan Pierson and Cory McArthy kept the tempo of the game in control.
“We had a sour taste in our mouths after dropping that overtime game. We wanted to end our season on a high note. We kept our loses to single digits. The Cadets finished 23-9 for the season. “We were prepared, we showed a lot of heart. As a coach, I couldn’t ask for more,” said McCormack.
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