CHILDRESS – The Canyon Lady Eagles showed for the first 32 games of the season, surprising nobody, why they’re one of the best Class 4A teams in the state.
Friday night, however, they ran into someone who was even better.
No. 2 Canyon faced No. 1 Decatur, the defending state champion, and found out why Decatur has that status. Canyon never led in a rare playoff rout, as hot-shooting Decatur rolled to a 62-43 in UIL Region I-4A championship game.
The two teams were hardly strangers and considering their respective rankings were on a collision course to meet again at this point. They met in this round last season, with Decatur beating Canyon 42-37 en route to a state championship.
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As far as Canyon coach Tate Lombard is concerned, Decatur may well win it again, as the Lady Eagles were sunk by a barrage of Decatur 3-pointers, 10 to be exact.
“To me they’re better than last year’s team,” Lombard said. “They’ve just got so many weapons. You have to guard their size first, and when they’re shooting the ball that way it’s a lot to come back from.”
In the first half, Decatur did to Canyon (30-3) what Canyon usually does to opponents in the playoffs, demoralizing the Lady Eagles with a huge offensive performance. Decatur led the entire first half and hit seven 3-pointers en route to taking a 37-25 halftime lead.
Canyon played respectably offensively in the first half, but it was no match for Decatur (35-4). Bralyn Peck, who has committed to Oklahoma State, had 10 points in the first quarter to lead Decatur offensively and finished with a game-high 21.
Decatur also beat Canyon most of the time on the boards until late in the half.
“Whenever you have to guard so tough to make them miss then they get the offensive rebound that’s kind of demoralizing,” Lombard said. “That’s something we knew going in, but when you’re in the fight sometimes it’s hard to concentrate. I thought that was a big difference. We could never get consecutive stops early.”
The Lady Eagles got as close as five points in the first quarter after Decatur jumped out to a nine-point lead. Decatur led by as many as 15 in the first half.
Things got no better in the second half for Canyon. The Lady Eagles were never able to whittle the deficit under double digits and got no closer than 11 points in the final two quarters.
Decatur built the lead to 53-30 by the end of the third quarter, making the outcome a mere formality over the final eight minutes. Canyon trailed by as many as 26 in the fourth quarter.
It was an intriguing coaching matchup between Lombard and Decatur’s Drew Coffman. who were teammates for a year at Midwestern State. Lombard was a senior and Coffman was a redshirt transfer from Texas Tech who starred on the scout team, so the two are familiar with each other.
“I know the Lombards are good coaches and they’re even better people with the product they produce every single year,” said Coffman, referring to Tate’s father Joe and his legendary career on the sidelines at Canyon and Nazareth. “Winning any game against them is a big thrill for us. We have struggled the last couple of games shooting the ball, but it’s one of those deals when it goes in, the bucket becomes the ocean and I felt our confidence kind of grew early on after making a few shots.”
Canyon, meanwhile, never got untracked offensively. Nobody scored in double digits for the Lady Eagles, as senior Tai Wright led the way with nine points.
It might not have been so much Canyon playing poorly, though, as it was Decatur just being that much better on this particular night.
“I really liked our game plan coming in,” Lombard said. “(Decatur) is so talented in so many different ways. That’s the best team we’ve played in awhile, certainly this year. They move the ball well and they’re tough defensively too. The first quarter we were kind of trading punches with them, but they were scoring at such a high level it’s hard to come back from that.”
Laken Coffman had 18 points for Decatur.
It was a symbol of Canyon’s fight that the seniors played almost the entire time in what turned out to be their final game. Senior starters Wright, Addison Cunningham and Kambrie Graser all remained in the game until the final buzzer.
“They mean so much,” Lombard said. “The last three minutes I asked them if they wanted to come out and they said no, so I left them out there. It’s a special group of kids.”