By Stephen Buus (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
The Miller Lady Cardinals won their third consecutive championship of the Stockton Invitational on Saturday, topping the El Dorado Springs Bulldogs (who were in the finals for a third time as well) 41-33.
Miller was already in a tough situation going in as one of their senior leaders, Kaylee Helton, was unavailable due to injury. The pressure mounted on the Cards when senior point guard Claudia Hadlock was called for an offensive foul, her fourth, with 3:10 to go in the third quarter. With a short bench, coach Sean Price rolled the dice and left Hadlock in the game.
“You’ve got to play basketball without fouling,” Price said. “We preach every day of playing defense without fouling, and we’ve done a great job all year and I don’t think we’ve had anybody foul out all year. Claudia’s a smart player and she knows she can’t get that foul and she’s able to stay in the game and play smart basketball and not pick up that fifth foul.”
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From there, junior Alyssa Hill picked up the slack for Miller, hitting three clutch three-pointers including one with 2:19 to play which put her team up 36-31. Hill finished with 15 points to lead the Cardinals. Hadlock added 13.
“Alyssa played great, but it was all five of our girls who showed up ready to play tonight,” Price said. “We had been practicing hard. We had been executing, we had been doing all the things we’d been expect to do every day in practice and tonight it showed against a really, really good El Dorado team.”
El Dorado, who beat Miller 11 days earlier by 14 points, struggled on the perimeter, hitting only 2 of 14 from beyond the arc in the second half.
“We did a really good job against (Hill) the last time, she didn’t really score,” El Do coach Beau Swopes said. “In the third and fourth quarter, she got hot. Defensively, we had to over-help. We didn’t our job guarding (senior Payten) Richardson or Hadlock, and our teammates had to step over and gave her too much room. When she started making some shots, it’s tough. We did our jobs against the other girls and she buried us there.”
Junior Macie Mays paced the Bulldogs with 16 points.
“I thought both teams played pretty good defensively,” Swopes said. “We had some mistakes where we didn’t have any help. We’ve got to have some kids be willing to step up and attack, but hats to Miller — they played well even with a kid down.”
El Dorado 9 8 7 9—33
Miller 9 4 13 15—41
El Dorado: Macie Mays 16, Reece Shaaf 9, Tevi Gurley 6, Wriley Taylor 2.
Miller: Alyssa Hill 15, Claudia Hadlock 13, Payten Richardson 6, Hailey Mart 6.
Other scores: Third place, Morrisville 54, Stockton 37. Consolation: Buffalo 45, Lamar 37. Sportsmanship award, Weaubleau.
