Published
March 4, 2010
Spartans in firing range
Granger routs Lakeside 61-40 behind second-half charge
By
SCOTT SANDSBERRY
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC
People around the
Granger girls basketball team call it "Fantasia range."
It's the range within
which junior guard Fantasia Reyes is comfortable shooting -- and, by
extension, absolutely deadly. Just how far and wide is Fantasia range?
Well, think in terms of an area code.
"Anything over
halfcourt, she's in Fantasia range," Spartans coach Andy Affholter said
with a grin after Reyes buried five of six 3-point attempts, a couple of
them from NBA range, and scored 20 points as Granger rolled to a 61-40
quarterfinal victory over Lakeside and moved into a 6 p.m. Friday semi
against SCAC rival Connell.
"She has a stroke,"
Affholter said. "When she gets it going ..."
On Thursday, she got
it going pretty much every time the Spartans (23-1) needed it. Reyes hit
an NBA trey that barely beat the buzzer ending the first quarter, and
then hit four during a 20-4 Granger run spanning the third and fourth
quarters -- right after the Eagles (22-4) had rallied to pull within
38-32.
"Sometimes it helps
when someone is on our case like that," said senior forward Sam Zapien,
whose 13 points pushed her over the 1,000-point career scoring mark (now
with 1,004). "It lights a fire under our butt." (Watch
the postgame presentation.)
And Reyes was
definitely feeling in the shooting groove, with that shooter's certainty
that any shot she took would find nothing but net.
"It feels like that.
It feels good," she said. "And I know my teammates are going to get the
ball to me."
Zapien and point guard
Janae Klarich were clearly looking to get the ball to Reyes during that
run.
"She's a great asset,
as you can see," Klarich said. "If 'Tasia's open, why not get it to her?
It's quite exciting sometimes when we're running a play and she puts it
up and you're like, 'No ...' and then it goes in. Hey, great shot."
Klarich, meanwhile,
after taking only two shots while dishing out a half-dozen assists in
Wednesday's first-round victory, took a more active role in the scoring
Thursday, going 4-for-7 from the field with a pair of 3-pointers for 11
points.
"I just wait until it
comes to me," Klarich said. "If somebody else is open, it doesn't matter
who scores as long as we're winning."
It looked like the
Spartans might win easily when they jumped out to a 16-7 first-quarter
lead. Lakeside got back into the game largely because of solid work
inside from 5-10 forward Kendra Lehue (14 points, five rebounds), but
6-foot Alex Daggy and Leslie Stillar spent much of the game in foul
trouble and were held to a combined 16 points.
Granger, meanwhile,
outrebounded the significantly taller Eagles 30-23, with Ashlee Reddout
hitting the boards for 10, and the Eagles had no answer when Reyes went
on her scoring binge.
Now the Spartans face
a red-hot Connell team that has beaten top-ranked Seattle Christian and
No. 5 Okanogan on back-to-back days. And Connell also very nearly
knocked off Granger in a regular-season game, losing by a single point
-- albeit a team that didn't have Klarich, the 2009 state-tournament MVP
during the Spartans' second-place run.
"It's nice because
we're playing a team we know," Zapien said.
"Yeah, but then
again," Klarich interjected, "they know us to. They play hard. It'll be
another fight to the finish."
|
Granger -- Gunnier 0, Klarich 11, Carpenter 2, Rodriguez 0,
Mengarelli 7, Reddout 6, Winterholler 2, Oswalt 0, Salgado 0, Zapien
13, Hull 0, Reyes 20. Totals 18-37 18-25 61. |
|
Lakeside -- Brittos 2, Rehwaldt 0, Dorra 0,
Flemming 0, Zappone 7, Lahue 14, Bassen 1, Stillar 9, Daggy 7, Tenny
0, Campbell 0, Widman 0. Totals 8-32 20-29 40. |
| Granger |
16 |
14 |
16 |
15 |
-- |
61 |
| Lakeside |
7 |
12 |
13 |
8 |
-- |
40 |
3-point goals--G 7-14 (Reyes 5-6, Klarich 2-4, Reddout 0-1,
Mengarelli 0-3), L 4-15 (Zappone 2-6, Stillar 1-2, Lahue 1-4, Bassen
0-1, Daggy 0-1, Brittos 0-1). Rebounds--G 30 (Reddout 10), L 23 (Daggy
5, Lahue 5). Assists--G 10 (Zapien 3), L 3 (Zappone 2). Steals--G 8
(Klarich 3, Reddout 3), L 2. Blocked
shots--G 4, L 0. Fouled out--Zapien. Total fouls
--G 19, L 17. Technical fouls--G bench.
Turnovers--G 13, L 15. |
|