The Piute ladies basketball crew celebrates its 2022 1A state championship victory on Saturday, March 5, 2022, on the Sevier Valley Heart in Richfield, Utah. Dave Anderson, for the Deseret Information
The Piute Excessive College ladies basketball crew secured its second consecutive state title after defeating Tabiona 38-30 on the Sevier Valley Heart in Richfield Saturday evening.
The win marks not solely a repeat title, however a brand new document for many wins in a season at school historical past, in line with coach Tim Westwood.
“We set a brand new document for probably the most wins for a ladies program at Piute with 25,” Westwood stated. “The women deserve it. They’ve labored so laborious.”
Tabiona began issues off by establishing an early lead over Piute.
“Tabiona is one heck of a crew,” Westwood stated. “They're very nicely coached with nice gamers. I knew we needed to take (Abbie) Rhoades out of the image. She is simply so, so good.”
Even with additional emphasis on Rhoades, she was nonetheless capable of safe 11 factors for Tabiona.
“It needed to be a conservative effort by everybody on the crew, and it actually labored,” Westwood stated.
The tide shifted with about three minutes left within the first stanza as Piute junior Tera Morgan hit two 3-pointers, adopted by a subject objective from teammate Hannah Wittwer, giving Piute a 12-4 edge.
“We performed this crew as soon as earlier than and it was a decent recreation,” Morgan stated. “We simply knew what we needed to do, which was work laborious and play protection. All of it got here from the protection.”
Whereas Morgan stated the emphasis was on protection, she led all gamers on offense with 24 factors.
Tabiona clawed its method again by halftime and was capable of knot the sport at 16 — all due to Rhoades, however Piute kicked its protection into excessive gear within the third quarter, holding the Tigers to only one rating from the sector, a 3-pointer from Mersadie Rhoades.
Piute was capable of construct a six-point edge heading into the ultimate interval, and that’s when Morgan received in a rhythm and scored 9 of her factors.
“Everybody thought that we have been a Kassidy Westwood-led crew, however we proved tonight that we're greater than that,” coach Westwood stated.
He stated Morgan’s game-leading effort of 24 factors was key to the victory, as have been the efforts of the remainder of the group.
“It was a one hundred pc crew effort,” Kassidy Westwood stated. “We knew 3s have been the one method they’d get again within the recreation, so we tried our greatest to cease them.”
“We really performed them earlier within the season, they usually beat us by one level in additional time,” stated Piute senior Ashton Winckel. “We got here in figuring out that they have been crew, and we have been mentally ready for it.”
The win proved to be a historic evening for Piute Excessive College for a variety of causes.
“That is Piute’s back-to-back state championships and we’ve by no means finished that earlier than,” Winckel stated. “It feels actually good that I used to be on the 2 groups that have been capable of accomplish that.”
“It means a lot to me,” stated senior Hannah Wittwer. “It means every little thing to me to have the ability to finish my senior 12 months with a state championship. My crew is aware of if coach Tim tells them to do one thing, they go proper out and do it.”
Coach Westwood stated he's glad to have coached the crew to a title in opposition to a powerful subject of contenders.
“When you had a straightforward highway, you wouldn’t get as mentally powerful and compete,” he stated. “We might be pleased with it, however we should be humble in our victories as a result of the opposite groups work simply as laborious as we do. We simply want to understand that we have been right here and that we may compete.”
Deseret Information 1A ladies all-tournament crew
MVP: Tera Morgan, Piute
Kassidy Westwood, Piute
Abbie Rhoades, Tabiona
Hannah Wittwer, Piute
Gracee Fabrizio, Tabiona
Abbee Hillman, Panguitch