Anna’s 6-foot-3 Adyson Bales scored 12 of her 14 points in the second half and made the clinching free throws to finally subdue Versailles. (Press Pros Feature Photos by Jeff Gilbert)
The first meeting two months ago ended strangely in Versailles’ favor. Anna’s redemption on Wednesday had its own strange flavor of unusual events.
Liberty Township, OH – Rematch, grudge match, but certainly not a mismatch.
Good luck finding two more evenly matched girls basketball teams in the Buckeye State than Anna and Versailles.
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The first encounter at Anna on January 3 was decided with no time on the clock in favor of Versailles. The second encounter on Wednesday night in a Division V regional final at faraway Lakota East High School required four extra minutes.
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Both games concluded with second-guessing of selves and officials.
And Anna won this time when it mattered most.
The Rockets overcame a buzzer-beating 3-pointer that forced overtime, Adyson Bales scored their final four points on free throws, and a final, awkward defensive stop secured a 50-49 victory and a berth in Saturday’s regional final.
“I don’t know that you can put it in words,” Anna coach Rusty Allen said. “I’m just really proud of the girls and their effort tonight. In so many cases tonight they could have just packed it in.”
Rewind two months to understand the backstory to Round 2.
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Anna led by two with three seconds left. Versailles inbounded the ball to their star Katey Litten, the MAC and Southwest District Division V player of the year. The Rockets had a foul to give, but they hesitated. Litten took two dribbles, and as she prepared to launch a half-court shot, an arm reached in and the whistle blew.
Foul.
“Was it a foul?” Allen said. “Probably. Do you typically call that foul in that situation? No. But they called it. I didn’t argue it. We fouled her. She still had to make three.”
“Obviously the girls wanted to go out and prove that they could win without something like that happening,” Anna head coach Rusty Allen said of how his team lost to Versailles in January on free throws after time expired.
That’s exactly what Litten did with all zeroes on the clock, and Versailles won by a point.
How much did that game linger for the two teams? They certainly had plenty of time to replay it in their minds on their long drives down I-75.
“It was going to be a battle regardless,” Versailles coach Tracy White said.
“Coach was telling us we should have a bad taste in our mouths,” Bales said. “We really wanted to beat them, and I think that really contributed to our effort and how hard we tried.”
“Anytime you play a team a second time, you’re going to talk about things, you’re going to talk about how they got us on foul shooting on a half-court shot,” Allen said. “Obviously the girls wanted to go out and prove that they could win without something like that happening.”
“It was annoying just because the way it ended,” Bales added. “Trying to think we can play in the tournament again, that really helped just because we knew they’re a beatable team, we’re a good team and we can beat them.”
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That brings us to a rainy Wednesday night in March and more twists and turns than the back way from Versailles or Anna.
Versailles had it going in the first quarter when Litten scored seven straight points for an 11-7 lead. But Anna showed a sign of things to come with late-quarter action. Adelynn McVety’s 3-pointer with 40 seconds left and Makenzie Mumaw’s 3-pointer with 11 seconds left blasted the Rockets to a 13-11 lead, sparking a 5-for-11 three-point day for the Rockets.
Katey Litten did all she could for Versailles with 22 points in her final game.
The second quarter dragged. Mumaw’s second foul with 7:25 left benched her for the rest of the half. With the score tied at 13, Litten’s second foul with 5:58 left did the same. With neither team’s playmaker on the floor, search and rescue teams were dispatched in search of the missing offenses.
The Tigers’ five points all came on free throws. Anna didn’t score until a free throw with 2:38 left. But the Rockets did it again in the final minute. Tori Osborn, who scored 13 points, hit a 3-pointer with 33 seconds left, and McVety made a shot in the lane for a 19-16 halftime lead.
“We couldn’t get a really any good rhythm on offense today,” said White, whose team made only 3 of 18 3-point attempts. “Just couldn’t get some shots to fall but played through it. I feel like our girls played hard for four quarters. They defensively were on it.”
Osborn scored the first four points of the second half, and the Rockets jumped out to a 27-18 lead by the four-minute mark. But Versailles regrouped and Litten’s 3-pointer left Anna with a 31-27 lead entering the fourth.
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Litten was just getting started on her 22-point performance. Her elbow jumper put Versailles up 34-33 with 3:15 left. Mumaw gave the lead right back to Anna with a layup off a turnover. Then with 1:50 left, McVety hit from three-point range for a 38-34 lead.
Litten didn’t let the deficit matter. She canned a three with 1:29 left to cut Anna’s led to one. The teams traded misses before Anna’s Vanessa Platfoot was fouled with 42 seconds left. She made both free throws.
Litten answered again with a drive into the paint and a short jumper. The Tigers almost stole the ball with their press, but Osborn was fouled and made two more free throws for a 42-39 Anna lead with 27 seconds left.
Versailles went to a timeout with 8.3 seconds left and called a play with a twist for a moment such as this. White knew Litten would draw Anna’s attention. The play called for 6-foot-3 center Kynnedi Hager to screen for Litten in the lane to open her up for the inbounds pass. That worked.
Versailles students, including some boys basketball players, celebrated Kynnedi Hager’s 3-pointer that forced overtime.
The twist White called for in the timeout was for Hager to pop out to the 3-point line as a second option if Litten was covered. Litten was covered, she passed to Hager who was wide open. She swished the 3-pointer with 1.5 seconds left.
Overtime.
Tied at 44. Tied at 46. Tied at 48.
The final tie was courtesy of two Bales free throws. The Rockets found their 6-3 center in the second half much more and she produced 12 of her 14 points.
Litten was fouled with 52 seconds left and made one free throw for a 49-48 lead.
The Rockets thought for a second they had taken the lead when Mumaw made a short jumper on the baseline. But just as she received the pass from a trapped teammate, Allen’s request for a timeout was granted.
No matter. The Rockets worked the ball into Bales on the right block. She spun around Hager for a reverse layup and a foul and, for a split-second she thought, the lead. But no, the foul was ruled to have been committed before the shot. So Bales made two more free throws.
“Scary,” Bales said. “You have a lot of pressure go on you on at the end, especially because they beat us last time on free throws.”
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Bales made both with 9.5 seconds left for the one-point lead.
“Winning on free throws by one is great,” Bales said for obvious reasons.
But before Bales could celebrate, the Tigers had one more chance to break her heart.
Versailles coach Tracy White signals for a timeout as Kasey Borchers takes a shot that went in but didn’t count because the timeout was granted first.
Anna players celebrate victory as Versailles’ Kynnedi Hager reacts to the heartbreaking loss.
Litten rushed the ball upcourt where White was signaling and screaming for a timeout. She wanted the timeout just as Litten crossed half court so the Tigers could run a final play from the sideline.
Litten kept playing and passed to Kasey Borchers all alone on the left baseline. She shot and scored. But guess what? It didn’t count. Timeout was granted with 5.5 seconds left by the baseline official before Borchers shot.
“I called it when my point guard was at half court,” White said. “I called it five times before they gave it to me. She was running right by me, so I don’t know if she was just watching the ball.”
Adyson Bales was a force for Anna on both ends of the floor challenging and blocking shots and scoring timely points.
White set up another play for Hager in the timeout to use a screen to get an open shot on the right side. But just as her players went in motion to set screens, the horn sounded for no reason and the officials blew the play dead. The Tigers had no timeouts to make an adjustment from what Anna had just seen.
“Unfortunately, with the inadvertent whistle, all of a sudden half of our play’s already gone,” White said. “That wasn’t handled correctly. It should have either been left to play out because the play had already started, or you send the teams back to your benches and figure it out.”
On the interrupted attempt, Hager ran to her right off a screen toward the baseline. The 5-5 Mumaw switched onto her.
“Of course Rusty says, ‘Hey, switch,’” White said. “He puts Bales on the block where she would have been on the elbow.”
That allowed the 6-3 Bales to switch onto the 6-3 Hager. The ball still came into Hager but Bales was able to challenge the shot more than Mumaw could have and it fell short. By the time a scramble for the ball ended out of bounds, the final buzzer sounded on Versailles’ season.
“Takes away your opportunity,” White said of the inadvertent whistle. “But unfortunately, you know, that happens. We’re all human.”
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The sudden end meant the end of Litten’s stellar four-year high school year. She helped the Tigers play in four regional tournaments. Next year she will play college basketball at Division II Thomas More in northern Kentucky.
“She’s a special player, and she’ll succeed at the next level, too,” White said. “She’s in the gym all the time, asking to get shots up. We have shooting before school, she’s there. Games that she had an off night this year, we got back from the bus, she went to the gym. She went through a slump for about three or four games and worked it out.”
Anna’s Tori Osborn scored 13 points and will be needed to help handle Fairland’s pressure in Saturday’s final.
Anna’s next task is Proctorville Fairland, a team with all but one player back from last year’s state semifinalists. The Dragons decimated Waynesville in Wednesday’s first game 76-38. Their full-court pressure created 16 first-half turnovers and a 51-16 halftime lead. The entire second half was played with a running clock.
“Obviously, it looks like we’re gonna have to handle some pressure,” Allen said. “If we handle the press, I don’t worry about us offensively. We have enough girls that can score. But we have to handle that press for 32 minutes because, unfortunately, our bench isn’t deep.”
No matter how Anna’s 2 p.m. Saturday matinee with Fairland turns out, it won’t be any more unforgettable than the Rockets’ two tangles with Versailles.
“It was a battle when we played at their place, and it was back and forth,” White said. “We faced some adversity then and faced some adversity here. It was kind of the same game. Just a different outcome.”
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