STATE EXTRA: CARTER: A team that plays together, wins

RICHMOND
Every now and then a basketball game lives up to the hype — and that was clearly the case Thursday morning when Buffalo Gap matched up against Franklin in a Group A, Division 1 semifinal game. Each are well-coached high school teams and last met in the 2008 state finals, where the Bison claimed the title with a convincing 83-66 victory.

Fast forward one year and, once again, you had head coaches Chad Coffey and Mona Sumblin leading their respective teams onto the biggest stage the Virginia High School League has to offer — the Alltel Pavilion at the Siegel Center on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University.

Making back-to-back trips to the Final Four is difficult enough at the collegiate level, where coaches are allowed to send their assistants out to the four corners of the country in search of the most talented athletes in the land. Imagine how much work goes in at the local high school where the coach is limited to the top prospects in the junior high gym class.

Coffey took the reins of the Gap program last season and the young man went out and did the unthinkable. The rookie head coach led his team to the above mentioned state championship. Coffey had been at the helm of the Bison baseball program for a few seasons before, doubling up and hitting the proverbial jackpot the first time out.

Winning the entire tourney your first time out creates some interesting issues for your follow-up season. Brittney Roberts graduated after scoring 18 points in the championship game, but the rest of the team remained intact for Coffey and the fans of the Black and Gold.

Coffey appeared relaxed moments before the opening tip of the rematch, smiling while talking to his coaching staff.

“We are happy to be back here again,” Coffey said. “We are trying to make sure that the girls relish the moment.”

You can pick your choice of sports clichés to try and sum up the Bison’s effort to repeat as Group A, Division 1 champions but I will go with the “there is no ‘I’ in ‘team’ ” theory.

The message that Coffey gives his squad is that you are competing with yourselves and not the scoreboard. This amazing group of young ladies buy into his message that the game is 32 minutes long and no one is bigger than the team.

Buffalo Gap defeated Franklin 56-47 in a well-played game that included just 19 total fouls despite the in-your-face defense being played on both ends of the court. One would only need to look at two plays from the game to see what makes the Bison Express run oh-so-smoothly.

Sara Lamneck picked up her second and third fouls in a 48-second span early in the second quarter. Lamneck had scored 10 of Gap’s first 17 points when she was forced to the bench. Coffey turned to his bench and called on fellow senior Courtney Sanderson for some inside help. Sanderson scored a quick six points on the strength of three offensive rebounds.

Gap trailed 18-17 when Lamneck exited and led 33-31 when she returned to the floor with 3:31 remaining in the third. Sanderson kept them in the game while Lamneck was out and Holly Morgan took care of the rest. Morgan finished with 18 points and 13 rebounds for the game to lead the Bison attack.

The play of the game for Morgan might have happened well after the fact when the junior missed a shot in the paint in the closing seconds. Leading by nine points, with less than 10 seconds remaining, Morgan turned around and raced down court. Having clocked 30 minutes of end-to-end action already, Morgan made it to the baseline to block the final shot from the Broncos.

Play hard, play as a team and play until the clock reads 0:00. The Lady Bison did all three on Thursday and it is a safe bet they will do it again Friday afternoon.

Editor’s note: In addition to co-owning the Waynesboro Generals, Jerry Carter also operates his Web site aroundthevalleyin60days.blogspot.com that is devoted to Region B sports. Carter has followed teams up and down the Valley, and offers a fan’s perspective into Thursday’s game.