By DAVE BELCHER
The Progress
The Moapa Valley High School girls basketball team competed and won the Southern 3A crown last week earning the right to play in this week’s Nevada State basketball tournament at the Lawlor Arena on the campus of University of Nevada, Reno.
The Pirates had earned the #1 seed and the right to host the southern regional tournament as long as they won.
The first game of the tournament was played on Tuesday, Feb. 13 against SLAM. The Pirates came away with a 62-34 win in that game.
It was in the second quarter when the Pirates opened up a huge lead over the Bulls by scoring a 26-7 run for a 36-11 halftime score.
Adding another ten point run in the third quarter, the Pirates coasted for the win.
Claire Cox led the team with 26 points. Cox shot 22 times making 10 of them including four three pointers. Hailey Western scored 16 in the win.
On defense, Sienna Neilson, Cox and Western each had 10 rebounds in the game.
On Thursday night the Pirates beat Coral Academy 45-29, in the second round of the tournament.
Coral came to town with an impressive 19-9 record and were the second seed from the Mountain Division. They had beaten Mater East in their first round game 51-40.
The Pirates started slow and only had a 6-3 lead after the first quarter. They increased it to 18-12 by halftime.
Hailey Western dominated as she scored 17 points in the game leading Moapa Valley. She also pulled down 12 rebounds.
It wasn’t until the fourth quarter that the Pirates pulled away outscoring Coral 14-6 for the win and a trip to Reno for the State tournament.
On the other side of the bracket, Pahrump Valley beat Cadence 55-10 to advance to play The Meadows. The Trojans beat the Mustangs 36-28 to advance. In doing so, they also won a ticket to the state tournament.
On Friday, Pahrump came to Moapa Valley for a low scoring defensive battle.
The Pirates had things going their way early as they built a 11-5 lead by the end of the first quarter.
Pahrump made a strong effort and held the Pirates to just 2 points in the second quarter taking the lead 14-13 by halftime.
Pahrump Valley maintained that lead heading into the fourth.
The Trojans started the scoring in the fourth with a three pointer for a 4 point lead.
Andie Wood would score the next five points for the Pirates, giving them the lead 24-23.
A Trojan layup and free throw would give them their final lead of the game 26-24.
Then the Trojans spent most of the final two and a half minutes passing the ball around the perimeter and shooting nothing but three-pointers that didn’t sink. But they got the rebounds. After three tries, the Pirates finally got the ball with 9 seconds left.
The Pirates turned the ball over when they couldn’t get the ball inbounded.
The Trojans inbounded under the basket and missed a contested layup turning the ball over to the Pirates again.
A long pass to Wood with 5 seconds left and a Trojan foul resulted in Wood making one of two free throws. The Trojans heaved a shot from half court, missed and the Pirates won the Region title.
Western led the Pirates with 12 points while Wood added 10.
Moapa Valley will play Fernley, the second seed in the North on Wednesday morning at 9 am.
