By GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Staff Writer
The Sitka High Lady Wolves rang their victory bell and cut down the net in Sitka High’s gym after securing the Region V 3A title by toppling the Mt. Edgecumbe Lady Braves in a tie-breaker game Thursday night.
The Lady Wolves celebrate their win Thursday. (Sentinel Photo)
Sitka High won 50-38 to seal the title.
They head north next week to close out the basketball season at the state tournament.
Sitka’s girls squad won the regional tournament last year as well, though the state championship was canceled as coronavirus cases surged around the world. But this time, with precautions in place, the championship bracket is less than a week away.
Excited for the final chance at play, Sitka senior Jocelyn Brady was happy to have one last opportunity to compete alongside her team.
“Working with a really good team, I’m really happy I have this team. I really love my team, they’re awesome and I really love having more opportunities to play with them,” Brady said after the victory.
After an abbreviated season packed with uncertainty, Brady couldn’t help but smile.
“It feels awesome, just another great opportunity to keep playing, so I’m excited,” she said.
Her teammate and captain Tawny Smith said there’s still more work to do before heading north.
“We’re going to take tonight to celebrate but we know we’ve got work to do in the next couple days because then we’ve got big goals at state. So enjoying the moment, but knowing that there’s work ahead of us,” Smith said.
As the pandemic has curtailed travel, the Lady Wolves have played only within Southeast this season. Beyond what’s on game film, little is known about the northern teams.
“It’s hard to compare our play to what they’ve been playing up north. I feel like we won’t know much until the first couple days of the tournament,” Smith said. She was eager for “new faces, new competition. Hopefully we’ll do well up there.”
Another Sitka senior, Makenna Smith, seconded this.
“It will be interesting going in because we really have no idea what anybody else looks like this year,” she said.
Looking back on the regional games and season as a whole, M. Smith was straightforward: “I’m super proud of everybody.”
The Lady Wolves and Lady Braves clashed three times this week, beginning on Tuesday. Sitka won by a handy margin in the first game, but Edgecumbe’s players pushed back on Wednesday and earned a win at the buzzer. With the series tied, the winner of Thursday’s game was set to take the title.
The Lady Wolves didn’t have to reinvent the wheel, however; they simply had to focus on the details and nuances of basketball.
“Just that we have to do the little things right and really just work hard and do what we know what to do,” Brady stressed. “Trying to not let them get in our head and going back to those basics.”
Tawny Smith agreed.
“I knew we had to all head out there and give it everything we got. I think we all knew what we were capable of, and we knew that if we did the little things right everything would fall into place… I was confident in what the team could do, and we just had to slow it down,” she said.
Despite the narrow loss on Wednesday, Makenna Smith was confident.
“We just had to come in and play our game… I was still confident… We just had to keep our composure, control the tempo,” she said.
For the Lady Wolves, Thursday marked a return to form.
Sitka led the game 16-7 after the first quarter. It was a deficit from which Edgecumbe could not recover. By the half, the Lady Wolves were up 24-12, propelled by an aggressive offense that at last seemed able to crack through the Lady Braves’ daunting full court press.
In the first half, the Brady sisters, Ava and Jocelyn, dominated Sitka’s scoreboard with a combined 15 points.
Sitka kept the lead through the second half, though a strong push from the Lady Braves - spearheaded by Laci Prince and TeHana Baldwin - brought the score within 5 points in the third.
But the Lady Wolves kept their heads above the water and stayed in the lead.
As the game moved into its final minutes, the dynamic became more physical, represented by the significant number of foul shots. In the fourth quarter alone, Tawny Smith scored 8 points on fouls, with her teammates notching a combined 6 more.
In the same period, Edgecumbe scored 3 points from fouls.
Sitka High coach Mindy Bartolaba was excited for the win, and grateful for the chance to play basketball.
“Oh, it feels great! It feels like this is what these girls have been working for all year, and I didn’t even know if we’d have regional championships. I’m just super thankful to be here and have the opportunity to play,” Bartolaba said after the win.
After the shaky start to the season, the coach said that in hindsight, she was surprised things made it so far.
“It surprised everyone. We were talking about how open gyms might be the extent of it, and we finally had a regional tournament here,” she said.
She praised her squad for playing hard for all four quarters to ensure the victory.
“Today they were just more prepared, and they really wanted it. They came out and played from the get-go and they didn’t lapse in their intensity for four quarters,” the coach said.
Much like her players, Bartolaba stressed the need to focus on the little things, particularly during the third quarter as the Lady Braves attempted a comeback.
“I called a timeout (in the third) and we talked about defense. We just really had to make sure we pinpointed - our thing today was to focus on the small things. Perfect those small things,” she recalled.
Looking to the future, the coach hopes to continue pushing her team on an upward trajectory.
“We want to start building on the things we learned this year and keep going,” she said.
During the interviews, the coach and players each held a small piece of the basketball net which they had cut from the hoop following the victory. While Sitka teams ring the victory bell following any rivalry win at home, a team cuts the net only after a tournament win.
With its small gymnasium, Sitka has not hosted a tournament in many years. Region V games in town are traditionally held at the much larger B.J. McGillis Gym on Mt. Edgecumbe’s campus.
“I don’t think the net has been cut down at Sitka High since, decades… I don’t know if it will happen again,” Bartolaba said.
The Lady Wolves travel north for the state championship next week. Games go from Thursday, March 25, to Saturday, March 27.
