The first half of the Camp Verde Cowboys girls basketball team’s regular season games all ended in losses, losing seven, before going 4-2 in the second half.
The team’s fifth win, over the Scottsdale Christian Eagles on Tuesday, Feb. 27, brought the team from No. 6 in the region to No. 4 following the game.
Going into the second half, the No. 3-ranked Eagles were up by two points. By the end of the third quarter, the Cowboys had a 10-point lead before the narrower final score of 45-41.
As of the morning of Friday, Jan. 30, the girls were ranked fifth in the region with a 6-9 record following Camp Verde’s 37-30 win over the Northland Prep Spartans on Thursday, Jan. 29, in Flagstaff.
It was a “tough game,” senior Wa’Siiva Lewis said. “One thing I was really thinking was ‘don’t fail, don’t fail.’”
“That whole fourth quarter, they kept their composure and that’s what I was preaching,” Head Coach Matt Harris said.
In previous games, freshman Kinlee Oothoudt said it was easy to get into their heads and lose the focus they needed for the win.
“In other games, we would just get nervous and throw the ball around and just rush,” she said.
Lewis said it would have been really easy for that to happen against the Eagles.
“We were getting fouled a lot,” she said.
Both teams had several fouls and several free throws throughout the game. In just the final 30 seconds, the Eagles were awarded three free throws and the Cowboys were awarded three sets of two. The Eagles made one of theirs, and the Cowboys made one from each set of throws.
During the final time-out, with eight seconds left on the clock and a score of 44-41, Harris told the team, “No threes. No Chino [Valley] repeats.”
“We faced Chino, our fourth game or fifth game of the year, and we had a comeback the third quarter, ended up taking the lead,” Harris said later. “We were up by two, and they came down. They screened us, they hit a dagger three. It went in. They hit a three on us and we lost that one.”
With only three points separating the teams in those final eight seconds, the Cowboys couldn’t afford a repeat of that game. The only shot that made it in those final seconds was a free throw shot by No. 3, Bree Phillips.
Harris said while the team is getting better with every practice at communicating and playing as a team, each player is improving, too.
“I was pleased with my defense,” Oothoudt, who normally plays guard, said. “I feel like I played [better].”
Lewis said her free throws were getting better.
The boys and girls teams had away games, after press time, on Friday, Jan. 30, against the Madison Highland Heat and Monday, Feb. 2, against Rancho Solano Prep Mustangs.
Camp Verde basketball will host its senior night on its last game of the regular season, at home on Thursday, Feb. 5, starting at 4 p.m. The girls’ game against the Scottsdale Prep Spartans begins at 5:30 p.m.
