Page girls fall in Copper Bracket title game

PHOENIX – Winners of last season’s 3A Conference, the Page girls basketball team reached its second consecutive state championship game on Saturday night.

This season, the Lady Sand Devils (19-10) competed in the inaugural Copper Bracket Championships. The Arizona Interscholastic Association introduced the new state bracket this season, which assembled the top programs in 1A, 2A and 3A playing in a 16-team bracket.

For one half in Saturday’s title game, the fifth-seeded Sand Devils stayed within striking distance against second seed Phoenix Country Day (27-5) that featured a pair of collegiate prospects in seniors Olivia Owens and Alia Kaibara as the pair finished with 24 and 20 points, respectively.

But in the second half, the 2A Eagles took full control as the Phoenix private school posted a dominant 62-35 win inside the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

“It’s not the outcome that we wanted,” fourth-year Page coach Celeste “Boka” Claw said. “We returned five players from the championship team last year, and the rest are underclassmen. I feel like we weren’t mentally prepared to be in (another) state championship game, so this was more of a wakeup call for a lot of our underclassmen.”

Still, Boka was pleased that her team kept the margin to seven points after one quarter of play. Despite being outscored 15 to 10 in the next stanza, Page trailed 32-20 at halftime.

“We were within five points,” Claw said of the deficit early in the second period. “We just didn’t have that spark to keep pushing forward. We let up and they pushed it back to 10, so it’s tough when you’re behind, when you’re trying to play catchup because it takes a lot of exertion from the girls.”

In the second half, the Eagles’ offense began to pick up as they nailed 5-of-8 treys in the third, including three by junior Erin Patterson, who finished with 11 points.

The Phoenix Country Day guard hit a trio of 3s from the baseline late in the third as the Eagles opened up a 49-26 cushion.

In the fourth, the Eagles connected on two early treys for its largest lead (55-36) following 3 from Owens with just over seven minutes left.

As a team, the Eagles made 23-of-47 shots from the field for 51.1%, which included an 8-of-20 effort from behind the 3-point line.

“Phoenix Country Day is a great team and they have some great players,” Claw said of Owens and Kaibara. “They were the two players that we needed to stop, but they were capable of creating their own shots and they were capable of moving the ball around.”

Offensively, Page senior post Leikara Yazzie finished with a team-best 20 points, which included a 7-of-11 effort from the field.

Other than Yazzie, Page struggled from the field as the Sand Devils hit 14-of-45 shots, which included a 2-of-13 from the 3-point line.

“We didn’t shoot the ball well, but one of our post players had a great night,” the Page coach said. “We just had to feed her a lot since our shots weren’t falling.”

Page’s key shooters – senior LeLaura Yazzie and juniors Tayla Franklin and Issianna Brown – went a combined 5-of-26 from the field with LeLaura Yazzie scoring seven and Franklin adding five.

“Those our main shooters,” Claw said. “But those kind of games happen and there is nothing you can do about it, even though we were getting some wide open looks.

“We do hit more 3s than that,” she added, “but it’s more of a defensive game and we let up defensively on a few possessions and that is what hurt us the most.”

Another key statistics that favored the Eagles was points from turnovers as Phoenix Country Day put up 25 points off Page’s 18 miscues.

“They were a challenge,” Leikara Yazzie said of the Eagles. “They’re a tough team and they’re very good. We tried everything to prepare for them, but they just played a better game than we did.

“We just had an off night shooting, but I’m very proud of my team for making the Copper Bracket,” she added. “It’s crazy because everybody doubted us this season, but we believed in each other.”

Leikara’s sisters, LeLaura, was equally grateful for making the finals of the elite bracket in the AIA small schools division.

“It really shows what we’re really capable of,” LeLaura said. “I mean, I think people were kind of bringing us down the whole season, and for us to come this far shows that we really improved a lot. We’re just really happy that we made it this far. It really says a lot about the team, and the year we had.”

The state final appearance was Page’s 18th overall, which put them in a two-way tie with Winslow for the most appearance in a state title game in Arizona.

“You know, it’s been a pleasure just to get here,” Claw said. “We were able to fight adversity multiple times this season. We played Tuba City for the fourth time and we had to beat them in the semifinals to get here.

“That was one of our biggest challenge, and I’m happy the girls were able to surpass them,” she added.

Page is set to graduation five seniors in Aubree Savage, Tyra Tadytin, Sarrayan Begaye and sisters LeLaura and Leikara Yazzie later this spring. The Page coach remarked that they left a lasting impression with her program and they will be sorely missed.

“These girls have been with me for four years,” Claw said. “Watching them grow from the freshman year to now has been tremendous. I have nothing but amazing things to say about them.

“All these girls have been involved in summer ball, and offseason was the biggest thing for a lot of them to continuously build that team chemistry,” she added. “It took a while to grow and mold them, but they’ve accomplished so much the past two years.”

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