Following midseason home losses to Catalina Foothills and Cienega, Sabino boys basketball coach Martin Roth could be forgiven for wondering where his team’s season was heading.
Thirteen consecutive wins later, the Sabercats stand on the doorstep of a Class 3A state championship game. Tuesday’s 56-53 win over Paradise Honors in Prescott advanced Sabino to the Class 3A state semifinals; the fifth-seeded Sabercats will play No. 1 Page on Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix, with the winner advancing to Saturday’s final.
Advancing won’t be easy: Page boasts a 29-1 record, with its only loss coming to a Utah team at the Lake Powell Holiday Classic before Christmas. The Sand Devils have won 21 straight games.
For the Sabercats, Wednesday’s win required a focused effort by several players in foul trouble. Fours were wild: Sabino started the fourth quarter with a small lead but with four players on the bench with four fouls. Quickly, they trailed by — you guessed it — four points, 46-42.
Pablo Gutierrez, Sabino’s top scorer, then fouled out. The Sabercats rallied.
“It was next man up, and that’s what the boys did,” Roth said.
Cesar Saenz had three straight big buckets, Jack Healy had a blocked shot, Jackson Campbell hauled in key rebounds, and Elijah De Altonga and Isaac De Altonga hit four crucial free throws in the closing minutes.
“There’s not enough room to give the true credit to every player. … Everyone was all in, and that’s the type of effort needed to get this far,” Roth said. “I can’t put in words how proud I am of every single kid.”
The Sabercats are going to have to embrace that singular focus one more time if they are to defeat a highly regarded Page squad.
Page is led by 6-foot-7-inch Stuart Sandall, who averages 14.7 points and 9.5 rebounds per game and is, according to Roth, “a defensive stopper.” The Sand Devils also shoot the 3-pointer frequently, having attempted 545 deep balls this season compared to 1,071 2-point shots.
“It obviously will be a great challenge as it always is at this stage,” Roth said.
Sabino’s girls to face Ganado in semis
The boys are not the only Sabercats team looking for a championship.
Sabino’s top-seeded girls team plays its semifinal game at 6 p.m. Friday at the Coliseum. The winner of Sabino’s game against No. 5 Ganado will take on either No. 2 Page and No. 3 American Leadership Academy- Gilbert North in Saturday’s final.
Sabino is led by junior Kiya Dorroh, who is averaging 15.9 points, 5.7 rebounds and 4.3 steals per game. Fellow junior Kamryn Doty is averaging 14.1 points, 5.0 rebounds and 4.5 assists per game.
Lancers return to final for 1st time since 2018
Second-seeded Salpointe Catholic topped third-seeded Catalina Foothills 56-50 on Tuesday night to earn a spot in the Class 4A state championship game.
The Lancers will face top-seeded Peoria (26-3) at noon Saturday at the Coliseum. It will mark their third appearance in the title game in four years. They lost 83-79 to Phoenix Shadow Mountain in the 2018 title game.
“We just have to keep doing what we’ve been doing,” senior guard Evan Nelson said. “I feel like we have the best team talent-wise, and we just have to put the same hard work and heart into it. … I think we’ll get it done.”
Senior guard Jordan Gainey scored a team-high 19 points against Foothills, and Nelson scored 18 — including seven in the fourth quarter.
To counter Catalina Foothills’ length in the frontcourt — 6-foot-9-inch junior Will Menaugh scored 12 for the Falcons — Salpointe’s all-guard lineup of Nelson, Gainey, Braden Miller, Jake Cioe and Grant Weitman constantly pushed the tempo and shot from outside.
“We could make their bigger guys guard our smaller guys away from the basket,” Lancers coach Jim Reynolds said. “Our lineup is unique, because all of our guys can handle the ball, all the guys can shoot, and they can all drive both to their left and right.
“We don’t seem to be totally taken advantage of for not being that tall. They’re all athletic guys and can rebound well for their size. Basketball has kind of gone to that a little more.”
Weitman’s three-point play in the first quarter gave Salpointe a 6-5 lead, and the Lancers stayed in command the rest of the way. Weitman finished with 15 points.
“We had a really strong first half, especially offensively, and they got into foul trouble, and we took advantage of that,” Reynolds said.
Catalina Foothills clawed back into the game during the second half. Hayden Moser’s 3-pointer cut Salpointe’s lead to 43-38 with 1:43 left in the third quarter. His layup less than a minute later capped an 11-point performance.
“They’re a good team, and they’re going to make a run,” Reynolds said of Foothills. “It’s not like we didn’t expect it. … It was a hard-fought battle, and we pretty much played with the lead from start to finish.”
Moser drew an and-one to make it a 53-50 game with 25.4 seconds left, but Nelson hit two free throws to seal the game.
“Evan Nelson was big for us down the stretch. He’s a big-time player who comes up and makes some big free throws,” Reynolds said.
