Prep girls basketball: Hope drives S-C past Warrensburg for crucial WCC win

Needing a win to keep its hopes alive for a second consecutive West Central Conference title, Smith-Cotton — and more specifically Lexi Hope — rose up and delivered on Friday night.

And it couldn’t have come against a better opponent: archrival Warrensburg.

Hope, who delivered a team-high 16 points, converted a traditional 3-point play with five seconds left and Smith-Cotton held on for much-needed 48-45 courtwarming win heading into Monday’s pivotal matchup with St. Pius X.

The Warriors, who split the title with Smith-Cotton last year, lead the WCC with a 6-1 mark, but close behind is 5-2 Smith-Cotton (12-10 overall), which ended a skid where it had lost seven of nine entering Friday night.

“We’re still in this thing,” said Smith-Cotton coach Chris Parsons, whose team improved to 6-4 at home. “All we have to do is win out. We knew a loss tonight would put us in a hole where we’d have to have other teams pick us up. But we wanted to take care of this ourselves, and Warrensburg beat us once so we knew they’d give us all we could handle.”

And he was right.

Warrensburg, which beat Smith-Cotton 40-38 at its house on Jan. 12, shook off a 14-point deficit in the first half and even pulled ahead 43-42 with 1:23 to play.

But Elana Sharp answered with a 3-pointer from the right wing as part of 15-point night, followed by Erin Brockhaus scoring two of her 17 points to knot the score at 45 with 15 second remaining.

Then, as the ball was being inbounded to Hope, the following exchange took place.

“Coach (Derek Skaggs) looks at me and goes, ‘Timeout, timeout,’ and I looked at him and said, ‘Lexi will take care of it,’ ” Parsons said.

And she did.

The 5-foot-6 point senior guard drove the length of the court, drew the foul in the lane and converted the runner with five seconds left. After the successful free throw, Smith-Cotton’s defense buckled down and didn't even allow Warrensburg to get off a game-tying attempt.

“She put the team on her shoulders and got the job done,” Parsons said.

The victory was a much-needed boost for Smith-Cotton, which stood at 9-3 overall and led the WCC with a 4-0 record on Jan. 6. That was before they dropped seven of nine, including a loss on Wednesday at O’Hara, to fall into second place in the league.

But on Friday night, the Lady Tigers came out a different team

Hope and Sharp scored five points each in the first quarter as Smith-Cotton led 14-7 after the first quarter.

Counting a trey from Mallory Hamilton to end the first stanza, Smith-Cotton reeled off five straight makes to extend the lead to 23-9, but Warrensburg didn’t go away quietly. Despite ending the half with 14 turnovers, Warrensburg went on an 18-4 run to end the half to trail 27-20 headed into the locker room.

Smith-Cotton then shot just 2 of 9 in the third quarter on a pair of 3s from Hope, and that left them clinging to a 33-31 lead headed into the fourth.

Sharp then put the team on her back her back in the fourth with eight points, none bigger than the trey that set the stage for Hope’s heroics.