NAMPA — The past two days, the Rocky Mountain girls basketball team has provided the Ford Idaho Center with some excitement in the opening game of both days.
Today, they’ll look to add an encore as the closing act.
The Grizzlies picked up their second overtime win in as many days on Friday, beating defending state champion Timberline 55-52 in the 5A State Semifinals. The Grizzlies (18-8) advance to the state championship game and will look to take home their first state title when they face Coeur d’Alene.
“It’s been my dream since I was a little kid,” said senior Zoe Archibald, who led the Grizzlies with 16 points and hit the shot late in regulation to send the game to overtime. “For the program, it’s going to be our (second) time there, so it will be a good experience.”
After a couple of noon games to start the tournament, Rocky Mountain will now be playing at the 8 p.m. slot on a Saturday night
“We cannot wait to play at night,” said Rocky Mountain coach BJ Humphreys. “As coaches and as players, we hate the day games. This season our league went to 3 p.m. Saturday games and it’s just hard, the energy is different, it’s different playing a game in the day. … We are fired up to play tomorrow night in the championship.”
The Grizzlies have certainly had little trouble creating their own energy in the quarterfinals and semifinals. In Thursday’s overtime win against Thunder Ridge, it was Averee Osterhout who hit the game-winning shot with 25 seconds left in overtime to knock off the Titans.
On Friday, they overcame a six-point deficit in the final 44 seconds of regulation before getting the win in overtime.
The Wolves (21-6) went ahead 43-37 on a pair of free throws by Piper Davis, and even Humphreys admitted that he thought at that moment it might not have been the Grizzlies’ night.
His team, however, had other ideas.
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Archibald hit a 3-pointer to cut Timberline’s lead down to 3, but after the teams traded free throws, the Wolves were once again up 45-40. Osterhout cut it down to 45-43 with a corner 3-pointer, and after Kailey Huegerich made one of two free throws for Timberline, the Grizzlies had a chance to tie the game.
The Wolves fouled Osterhout, sending her to the free throw line for a one-and-one opportunity. Osterhout missed the first shot off the front of the rim. But Brielle Magnuson was in position to get to the ball first off the rebound and tipped the ball back to Archibald, who fired it in to tie the game at 48.
“The confidence she has in herself is definitely admirable,” said junior Cianna Legaspi, who finished with 13 points and 13 rebounds. “She’s a really consistent shooter, she has one of the highest shooting percentages on our team.”
Legaspi had four points in the overtime period, as Rocky Mountain took a 55-50 lead. The Wolves had a chance to tie the game with 4.6 seconds left after a five-second violation on an inbounds pass. But a Timberline 3-point attempt fell no good, sending Rocky Mountain back to the title game for the first time since 2014.
“I was a little bit nervous, but I still believed in our team that we could get the stop,” Archibald said. “We’re a great defensive team.”
In addition to Legaspi, Anna DaBell also finished with a double-double for Rocky Mountain, scoring 10 points and pulling down 13 rebounds.
Rebounding, particularly in the second half, Humphreys said, was the key for the Grizzlies. {span class=”ui-provider ux b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z ab ac ae af ag ah ai aj ak” dir=”ltr”}Timberline went into halftime with an 18-17 advantage and Rocky Mountain finished the game with a 40-36 advantage.{/span}
“Typically, our goal is to tie the rebounds, because we’re not a big team, so we try to tie,” said Humphreys. “We ended up winning the boards by four, which was huge or us. And we talk about rebounding, Zoe’s going to shoot it, Averee’s going to shoot it, Cianna’s going to shoot it, we have to crash the boards. Those were just hustle plays.”
Freshman Emmi Swillie led Timberline with 21 points and nine rebounds, while Huegerich finished with 12 points. The Wolves will face Boise in the third-place game at noon today at Ridgevue High.
