The sr. girls AAA final was a thriller that went down to the wire as Yasmine Kadri's scooped in the game winner as time ran out to give Holy Names a 47-46 win over the undefeated St. Joe's Lasers. "I didn't even know it went in." said the grade 11 guard. "It was incredible. Like 20 people jumped on top of me. It was crazy."
Holy Names led 29-18 at the half before Mya Tate went off and single handedly led the Lasers back into the game. Tate dropped two consecutive three-pointers to spark St. Joe's who went 10-0 during the regular season. "Once that first shot went in I just had so much confidence in myself and I just felt every shot after that was going in." said Tate. "Kept shooting and shooting and I got more confidence on my defence and that's when I could stay in front of people and get more steals and find my teammates. Everything felt good for me."
Her scoop layup with 3:57 left in the 4th gave the Lasers a 46-40 lead but that was the last time they would score. Holy Names chipped away on offence while holding down the fort on defence. Maysa Arabi picked up a defensive rebound and took it the other way for a layup with 3:01 remaining. Fiona Lukassen hit a three pointer with 1:08 left in the game setting up a wild finish.
St. Joe's inbounded the ball three times with Holy Names fouling twice. Jane Pozzi disrupted the third attempt in front of the Holy Names bench. The ball went out of bounds last touching a Lasers player with 8.3 seconds left.
On the final play Kadri received a screen up top and drove the net beating the buzzer for the winner. "We battled." said Knights head coach Sean Culhane. "We showed I thought a lot of mental toughness tonight so I was happy."
The loss was devastating for the Lasers who lost scoring threat Ariah Hutchings in the first half with an ankle injury. She tried to come back in the second half but was able to impact the game. "It hurts." said a visibly shaken Tate. "The last game we had to win it couldn't fall for us but we all gave all we had and I'm happy for our team but it just it just hurts."
Tate led all scorers with 22 points. Maya Fuerth had 17 for the Lasers. Arabi led the Knights with 14. Pozzi had 13.
Check out the highlights and post game thanks to our local sponsors.
For more local sports check out our website.