March means memories

“You want to go to state basketball...why?”
My husband is not nostalgic like I am, so I told him a big part of the reason: to take pictures of Bridgeport and Leyton. There are few places in Nebraska better than PBA and Devaney in which to take pictures.
But a bigger reason is that 30 years ago this weekend I laced up my shoes for the final basketball game of my high school career. Unlike my husband, I’m extremely sentimental.
I’ve forgotten most of that season, but some things still stand out.
Getting off the bus at Beaver City for our final regular season game and thinking “Nothing is given after this.”
The subdistrict game when my classmate, who had returned a month earlier from an ACL injury she suffered during the previous track season, tore the ACL in her “good” knee.
Wallowing through a terrible slump going into state.
Drawing a charge in our first round game versus randomly tripping a ball handler at midcourt in Pershing, being called for a foul in that semifinal game and feeling totally useless.
That final game at Devaney, tying my shoes before the game and thinking, “Does it even matter, it’s over no matter what?”
Of course it mattered, especially for the pride the community felt.
Despite so many memories disappearing over the years, what really stands out are the games of pitch in the back of the bus and my teammates who went out of their way to make sure I got a fair shake.
We set a new standard for girls’ teams, and Wauneta-Palisade was right there with us, rewriting the record books to show that, yes, girls’ teams can put up a lot of points and showing everyone back east that, yes, small town schools can play high quality basketball.
That year, 1993, was the first time the Omaha World Herald did an all-class top 10. Here we were, a Class C2 school, ranked No. 4. I’d put the following year’s Cambridge team up against anybody, but as a whole, girls basketball has improved exponentially over the years.
Looking back, I can see a lot of similarities to this year’s Bridgeport team.
Both teams were led by a pair of sisters. I perked up when the News Channel Nebraska announcers went through the list of top scoring sister duos ever. My teammates, Jami and Nicole Kubik, are number one. Ruthie and Olivia Loomis-Goltl were fourth going into the tournament.
Both teams had disappointing finishes to the end of the previous season. We blew a double-digit halftime lead and lost by one in the semifinals. Bridgeport lost in last year’s C2 finals by a bucket.
Both teams blew through the regular season to head to Lincoln undefeated and were ranked in the all class top 10 despite the pressure of knowing all eyes are on you, waiting for you to mess up and the pressure you put on yourself wanting to improve on the previous year’s finish.
Unfortunately for Bridgeport this year, their season didn’t have the happy ending ours did. The Bulldogs played Saturday for third place, rather than battling for a state championship.
With all the focus on the Loomis-Goltl sisters, the Omaha World Herald and Lincoln Journal Star missed some of the best stories of the tournament. Not only were four panhandle schools at the state tournament, Class B Scottsbluff and Sidney, Class C1 Bridgeport and Class D2 Leyton, but Sidney and Bridgeport are only 40 miles apart with Leyton in between them. That’s some good basketball in a small area.
Only six years after fawning over Red Cloud suiting up six players at the state tournament, the OWH and LJS ignored Leyton’s seven players and the fact they were making their first trip to the state tournament since 1983. Besides that, the Warriors have one of the state’s top offensive threats, Zaili Benish. With no seniors on this year’s team, hopefully Leyton will make it back next year and get the attention it deserves.
Watching Leyton’s kids, coming from two towns with a total population of less than 500, line up against Falls City Sacred Heart, coming from a town with a population of 4,000, highlights the discrepancies in Class D2. Leyton truly embodies what a D2 school should be.
My favorite play of the tournament was that game’s opening tip. Leyton Coach Jed Benish sent out his 5’1” guard to jump against a 5’11” post from FCSH. Rather than compete for the tip, the Leyton player read the FCSH jumper’s hand and immediately broke for the ball. It was the type of out-of-the-box thinking I love!
A few other things I noticed in Lincoln.
Call me Captain Obvious, but it’s tough to get a win at state if you don’t rebound.
Nobody ever doubted Britt Prince’s talent, but the Elkhorn North junior raised her level of play over the weekend. Prince shot 12-15 in the Wolves’ first round game and finished with 28 points. In the semifinals, Elkhorn North completely dismantled York, 62-20. Prince was 11-12. Her only miss was from near half court in an attempted buzzer beater, and scored 30 points in three quarters. Then came the final game against Skutt, the only team to beat Elkhorn North. Prince made 5-7 threes and was 9-9 on free throws, finishing the game with 26 points.
If you have a chance, catch one of Prince’s games and see the player who may be Nebraska’s best ever.
There were blow outs. In Class B, Elkhorn North and Skutt laid waste to the rest of the field. Shelton beat Wilcox-Hildreth 55-22, and it wasn’t as close as the score makes it seem.
There were upsets. Nos. 1 Crofton and Ravenna lost.
But I thought Class C1 had the most parity of any of the classes. In first round games, top-seeded North Bend Central beat Yutan 48-43, fifth seeded Malcolm beat fourth seeded Wahoo 46-32, Bridgeport, the No. 2 seed, won 61-57 over Lincoln Christian and third seeded Hastings Adams Central topped Gothenburg 45-38.
The semifinals really showed how tough the class was. NBC took a six-point win, 48-42, over Malcolm after the Clippers lost their second leading scorer to injury in the first three minutes of the game. NBC only made one fourth quarter field goal, but made 10-14 free throws, while a Malcolm freshman scored 19 of its 22 points in the second half. Watch out for Halle Dolliver. Then came Bridgeport’s overtime loss to Adams Central, 44-47.
NBC would go on to comfortably win its fourth straight championship, while Bridgeport duked it out with Malcolm for a consolation win.
It was a fun weekend in Lincoln.
Don’t tell my husband, but it won’t be another 10 years, another anniversary, before I make it back to girls state basketball.