2A girls basketball semifinal: South Sevier barely holds off North Sevier

RICHFIELD — South Sevier coach Randy Madsen may have summed up his Rams' 41-40 semifinal win over North Sevier best.

"Time just ran out while we happened to be ahead by one," he said. "We could play that team every day for the next three weeks and you might have a different winner every game.

"That was just a battle of two of the best teams in the state, and we were fortunate to be the team that won it today when it mattered most."

The two top-ranked teams in the 2A classification played the most entertaining game of the tournament. But it didn't start out that way.

Both teams appeared nervous in the opening quarter. They were missing shots, turning the ball over and not playing the type of basketball they had both exhibited in their quarterfinal wins. Everybody, that is, except North Sevier's Chanda Hallows.

Hallows had all eight of the Wolves' points in the opening quarter. If not for her picking up her second foul just five minutes in, perhaps North Sevier could have built a lead. As it was, the quarter ended deadlocked at 8-8. It was 15-12 at halftime before both teams stepped it up in the second half.

"We knew we weren't playing that well," said South Sevier's Jacee Curtis. "We just didn't want to lose playing a game like that. We knew we had to step it up."

Curtis had a built-in excuse should things have turned out differently. Three weeks ago, she broke her left arm. The doctors put a plate in her arm just above the wrist and recommended a hard cast be put on.

"I told them, 'No way,'" said Curtis. "State was just a couple of weeks away, so I wanted to tough it out."

Curtis, playing with just a pad and some tape on her arm, finished with six points, but even more important was her defense on Hallows. The Wolves' leading scorer finished with 22 points, but Curtis was all over her and forced her to work extremely hard for her points.

The two teams entered the fourth quarter tied at 28. That's when the stars took over — JD Parsons for the Rams and Hallows for North Sevier. Both scored eight points, but it was Parsons that had the two biggest plays.

With 37 seconds remaining and South Sevier trailing by one, Parsons stepped to the free-throw line and knocked down both shots to give her team the lead 41-40.

With only nine seconds remaining, North Sevier had one last shot. The ball went in to Hallows, and with Curtis in front of her, Parsons blocked the shot from behind. After a scramble and another missed shot at the hoop, South Sevier had advanced to tonight's 2A championship game at 5 p.m. in the Sevier Valley Center to face Richfield.

"This is just an incredible feeling," said Parsons. "It is one of the best games I have ever been a part of, and I am just glad that we were the ones that were able to get it done."

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