KELSEYVILLE — The little team that almost couldn”t early on in the 2006-07 season ran headlong into Division IV basketball royalty of sorts on Wednesday night during the opening round of the North Coast Section girls” basketball playoffs at Kelseyville High School.
When it was over, the Piedmont Highlanders, state champions in 2004 and 2005 and NorCal finalists a year ago, emerged with a 48-31 victory that was anything but boring or routine.
“We were getting some playoff jitters out, but Kelseyville did a good job tonight,” Piedmont head coach Bryan Gardere said when asked about his team”s struggles on offense the Highlanders shot just 36 percent from the field.
An inspired effort by the Knights (20-9), who entered the 12-team Division IV tournament as the 12th seed, contributed to the Highlanders” shooting woes, according to Kelseyville head coach Jim Salmina, who was smiling and upbeat following the season-ending loss.
“To start the season 1-6 like we did and finish 20-9, it”s kind of a Cinderella season,” said Salmina, who added that he couldn”t have asked more from his players in their playoff opener, especially considering the opposition.
“We lost to the last-place team (John Swett) in their league earlier in the season,” Salmina said. “So to come out here tonight and play them as hard and as well as we did, I”m proud of these girls. I love these kids & they played hard for me all year.”
The Knights were as close as six points after Jill Bailey buried a jump shot late in the third quarter to make it 31-25. And they were still within single digits of the Highlanders with 6:19 left in the game. But after Lauren Nixon hit one of two free throws with 5:14 left to cut Piedmont”s lead to 38-28, the Highlanders took control, outscoring Kelseyville 10-3 the rest of the way.
“We just didn”t convert a high enough percentage of shots inside,” Gardere said of his Highlanders, who missed quite a few attempts from the paint. “We had a number of open looks and took good shots, but they didn”t drop.”
“A lot of that was us,” Salmina said. “We kind of packed it in on defense because we heard they”re not a very good 3-point shooting team. Their game is inside and I thought we did a pretty good job taking that away from them.”
That the Knights played so well on the defensive end is no surprise to anyone who has followed the team this season. The Knights won 19 of their final 21, including 11 straight going into Wednesday”s game, largely because of their prowess on defense.
Kelseyville trailed 16-5 after one quarter and 26-13 at halftime, hardly an insurmountable deficit, especially at home, according to Salmina.
“I told them at halftime that we were only down by 13 and we just needed to keep playing good defense, cut down on our mistakes and hit a few shots,” Salmina said of the recipe that the Knights used in the third quarter to throw a decent scare the Highlanders” way.
After Casey Morris” steal and driving layup in the opening seconds of the second half gave Piedmont a 28-13 lead, the Knights made a run at the Highlanders, so much so that the momentum in the game had definitely turned, according to Salmina.
“We felt it turning,” Salmina.
Allyson Brown got things going for the Knights by hitting a 3-pointer. Nixon, who entered play 21 points shy of the 1,000 mark for her career, scored her first two points of the game at the 6:56 mark, sinking two free throws to make it 29-18. Jodi Snider hit a 3-pointer a short time later to make it 29-21 and the Highlanders promptly turned the ball over on the inbounds play.
Nixon drew another shooting foul with 4:45 left and made both free throws to cut Piedmont”s lead to 29-23. Morris and Bailey exchanged baskets to keep the deficit at six — 31-25.
But when the Knights need just one more basket to really excite the home crowd, they couldn”t get it and the Highlanders took advantage by scoring the final two baskets of the quarter for a 35-25 lead.
“We made a couple of silly mistakes there and forced a couple of shots that we didn”t need to force,” Salmina said.
Morris held the High-landers together when they were struggling mightily and she finished as the game”s leading scorer with 13 points. Teammates Dom-inique Hamilton and Airika Warren also finished in double figures with 12 and 10 points, respectively, and Sarah Tamulski had nine.
“She missed a lot of shots too, but she kept running the offense and kept us focused down the stretch,” Gardere said of Morris, a fine ballhandler, passer and playmaker. “This is a young team and the expectations here (at Piedmont) are pretty high, so they all were a little nervous in their first playoff game.
“But the bottom line is we get to keep playing. I”ll take an ugly win over a pretty loss anytime,” Gardere said.
“They weren”t as fast as we thought they were going to be but they”re as athletic as heck,” Salmina said of the Highlanders, who have made it to the NorCal finals four straight years & although with a different cast of players in previous seasons.
“They just dropped 70 points on Salesian a couple of games ago, so to hold them to 48 is pretty amazing,” Salmina said of his squad, which has only two senior starters — Bailey, who finished with seven points, and Nixon, who finished with five — all on free throws.
Junior guard Jodi Snider led the Knights with 11 points.
“I think we gave them (Highlanders) everything they could have wanted,” Salmina said.
