CHILDRESS – Going into the fourth quarter of Friday night’s Class 5A Division I region final against Denton Ryan, the Tascosa Lady Rebels had every right to think they could complete a comeback and pull off the program’s most successful season in 35 years.
In the end, though, against the same opponent, they had the same end as last season.
Which is not to say it wasn’t successful. However, Tascosa had an offensive slump at the most inopportune time and defending state champion Ryan was able to pull away for a 54-34 victory and advance to the state semifinals.
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It was a closer game than the final score indicated, although Tascosa (32-4) never led all night. Had it not been for that fourth quarter slump, things could have finished differently, or at least closer.
“Denton Ryan’s super athletic, they play uptempo and they’re physical,” said Tascosa first-year coach Zac Tabor. “They kind of wore us down by the fourth quarter with that. We felt like we were rocking and rolling then all of a sudden we look up and they were on an 8-0 run and the game kind of slipped away. Hats off to them for finishing the fourth quarter.”
After struggling offensively in the first half, Tascosa still trailed only 26-20 at halftime. The Lady Rebels got the deficit down to four three times in the third quarter, and at the end of the period they trailed 34-30.
However, that was as good as it got. Ryan’s Atiya Everett opened the quarter by converting a three-point play. It was a harbinger of things to come, as Everett carried the Lady Raiders (35-4) by scoring their first 10 points of the quarter.
Tascosa’s Devaeh Johnson scored on a drive to the basket to cut it to 37-32. That was indicative of the night for the Lady Rebels though, as Johnson would also score the only other points of the quarter for Tascosa, by which time the deficit had grown unmanageable.
Johnson had 14 points, but no other Lady Rebel had more than six. Part of the problem was that Tascosa had a tough time dealing with Tascosa’s superior size, particularly 6-foot-3 post Kaylin Jackson and 6-1 Kinley Lewis.
“(The Lady Raiders) have a 6-3 at the rim and a 6-1 guard who’s one of the best jumpers in the state,” Tabor said. “We definitely knew it was going to be tough going in so we tried to lift them away from the basket the best we could. They’ve got great instincts and they rotated down there pretty well and got a few blocks.”
By the fourth quarter, it was well established that Ryan wasn’t going to give up anything too easily on defense.
“We had to rely on our defense,” Ryan coach Monesha Allen said. “There’s still a few things that need to be corrected in there but it was a matter of playing with poise and discipline with the game being so close. We’ve been here before and we had to play like we’d been here before.”
That the game was close going into the fourth quarter is a testament to Tascosa’s tenacity. Ryan jumped on top early, taking a 15-3 lead in the first quarter and a rout looked highly possible.
Tascosa, though, chipped away at the lead and was never out of the game over the next two quarters. Johnson scored six in the second quarter to help cut into the deficit before halftime.
“I’m definitely proud of the kids,” Tabor said. “They’ve had no give-up in them at all and they’ve continued to fight no matter what the circumstances are. That’s what Tascosa’s going to be about. I knew we’d fight back and make it a game, unfortunately we ran out of gas at the end.”
Tabor arrived at Tascosa last summer after former coach Chris Sumrall retired from coaching. He inherited a team which reached this same round last season and had the group adapt to his system, getting mostly successful results.
“I think it was a really good year,” Tabor said. “It’s tough when you take over a group which has had a lot of success because you’ve got to try to emulate the buy-in really, really quick. These kids are awesome and they bought in to what our new staff was teaching. They really took to our coaching style.”
Zaviyana Madison had a game-high 18 points for Ryan, carrying the load with 14 in the first half. Everett scored all 16 of her points in the second half, including 12 in the fourth quarter.
Lewis scored 12 points, including eight in the first quarter.