Curtis Baptist claims SCISA Class A girls basketball state crown

         Sumter – The Curtis Baptist girls basketball team finally got to the top rung of the ladder on Friday at Sumter County Civic Center.

       The Crusaders, who had progressed up the playoff ladder in each of head coach Tim Johnson’s first three seasons, finally got to take home a state championship trophy. They beat Wardlaw Academy 56-36 to claim the SCISA Class A title.

       “My first year we reached the Elite Eight and lost,” said Johnson, whose team finished with a 19-5 record. “The second year we went to the Final Four and lost. Last year, we made the state championship game and lost (to Cross Schools, which is actually playing for the AA crown this year).

       “That’s been the mantra, this is it. We’re getting better every year without fail, and here it is.”

       This was the first state championship for the Augusta, Georgia, school since 1995 when it was a member of the Georgia Independent School Association.

       It’s just amazing,” said senior leading scorer Jaliyah Terry, who is in her first year at the school. “All the work I put in this summer really showed that I wanted it, that I didn’t want the same thing that happened last year to happen this year. I have an amazing set of teammates around me who push me every day, so it just means a lot.”

       While the defending state runner-up, this was basically a new team for Curtis Baptist. The Crusaders lost four key senior contributors from last season as well as have its second leading scorer transfer.

       “I think we started off with a new team really,” said senior Lily Kilroy, who was a fulltime starter this season after seeing some starts last year. “We had young players, but we blended well together. We have good players, good coaches, and we give all the glory to God, and that’s why we’re here today.”

       Curtis Baptist led 14-10 after one quarter but began to take control of the game in the second quarter. Led by Terry’s 11 points and a withering 2-1-2 pressure defense, the Crusaders pushed the lead to 33-19 by halftime.

       “We struggled with the press,” said Wardlaw head coach Kristina Graves, whose team finished the year with a 13-9 record, three of the losses coming to Curtis Baptist. “Curtis was very aggressive, very handsy, and some of the calls weren’t called our way I thought. We lost because of the press in my opinion.”

       The Crusaders used what Johnson calls its Georgia 2-1-2 press. While effective, when Wardlaw was able to break it, it was getting points off of it.

       “We were supposed to drop back into an extended 2-3 zone, but our forward wasn’t dropping back,” Johnson said. “Once the forward got down where she was supposed to be, we started to turn things.

       The press had Taylor and junior Maci Butler up top with the Kilroy sisters handling the back end.

       “Jaliyah and Maci are terrors up top,” Lily Kilroy said. “My sisters (freshmen starters Amelia Kilroy and Nada Kilroy) and I know what each other is thinking. It was only the second time we had used the press, but it worked really well.”

       Terry said the Crusaders simply had to hit their stride.

       “We basically just got all of our jitters out,” she said. “Everybody was nervous coming into the game. They didn’t want to mess things up. We had a game plan, we stuck to it. In the first quarter it didn’t really work so well, but we knew it was a good one, so we stuck to it.”

       When Curtis Baptist scored the first 10 points of the second half to make it 43-19 with 5:14 still remaining in the third quarter, it pretty much had the game in hand. Amelia Kilroy got things started with a basket. Lily Kilroy connected on a 3-point basket, Taylor hit a jumper and Lily Kilroy banged home another trey to end the run.

       Terry led the way for Curtis Baptist with 20 points. Butler, the team’s leading scorer from a season ago, finished with 12 points. Lily Kilroy had nine, all on 3-pointers, Nata Kilroy and Amelia Kilroy both had five, and seventh-grader Sa’Renity Calabrese had three.

       Leading the way for the Patriots was junior Taylor Hill with 12 points. Senior Maddie DeLoach had nine, junior Katherine Trotter had five, senior Hailey Holmes and sophomore Charlotte Bailey both had four, and senior Liz Parks finished with one.

       Graves won state titles playing for Wardlaw in 2006 and 2008. In her 11^th season as head coach, her goal is obviously to bring another championship trophy to the school as a coach. She had nothing but praise for her squad.

       “I’m so proud of my girls,” she said. “They really fought from the first game to the last game. They’ve gotten so much better, made so much improvement. They’re dedicated. I told them before the game, win or lose, I’m proud of them.”

       Selected to the All-Tournament team from Curtis Baptist were Lily Kilroy, Terry and Butler. Hill and DeLoach were the Wardlaw selections, and Richard Winn Academy’s Charlotte Lewis was the final selection.