Unluckily all too familiar with either losing a large lead or coming up just short in other close contests, the Wolverines made sure Tuesday evening that Montezuma-Cortez, this time, would feel the pain of both.
Bayfield fought an uphill battle ever since Panther Myra Simmons scored an early three-pointer, but the girls finally leveled the score with 3:22 left in the third quarter, 25-25 via a Chloe Weybright trey. The Wolverines then briefly took command at 27-25 when fellow senior Jade Sanders sank a short baseline jumper with 1:12 to go.
M-CHS senior Kaeleen Boggs managed to re-tie the score at 27 just before the quarter expired, but momentum in the contest had visibly shifted in the guests' favor, and irreversibly so.
After senior Kyle Baker hit two free throws to re-take a 31-30 advantage, BHS would not let it slip free again. Sophomore Jordan Lanning reeled off eight straight press-driven points, totaled all her 11 in the final frame, and the Wolverines secured a 50-32 road win to end the 2016-17 regular season.
"I'm just real proud of them because they took care of business," declared Head Coach Lana Killough. "They took care of the ball, they were awesome on the press tonight, and we made a dent."
"I just felt like I needed to step it up a little bit!" said Lanning, who'd initially entered the game from off the bench. "So I went for every steal I could, trapped every time I could, you know? Just hustled."
"Jordan, she just did so great!" Baker extolled. "Like, I'm so proud of her; this is definitely her best game. I hope her next years of high school treat her this well. Or better, even!"
"It's an awesome feeling, knowing that this was "their" night - their Senior Night - and we just put it together," she continued, alluding to Bayfield's own promising but unfulfilled Senior Night loss to Alamosa last Friday. "That's just such a confidence-builder."
MCHS tried, but couldn't compete against Bayfield's full-court resistance.
"It was pretty tough," said Montezuma-Cortez sophomore Aryelle Wright. "The last game it was the pressure that really got us, and this game too. The press really got us."
All told, during the closing eight minutes Bayfield (6-13, 2-8 3A Intermountain) outscored M-CHS 23-5 and did not allow the Panthers a field goal - a full reversal from how the action first unfolded.
"They just got us flustered and off-guard," admitted Baker, who led all players with her 15 points and was 9-of-12 from the foul line (as a whole, BHS was 17-of-26). "I mean, they did good; they moved the ball quick, and fouls got us in trouble."
Powered by Payton Keith's two second-quarter threes, Montezuma-Cortez (1-18, 0-10) held the upper hand at halftime, 22-16. Her first potential dagger expanded an 11-3 lead after the first quarter to an imposing 16-3 with 5:56 before the break, and the second halted BHS' ensuing 7-0 counterstrike-keeping the home side ahead 19-10.
"We knew that if we flustered them like they did us in the first quarter, then we'd get our points," Baker said. "And that's exactly what we did; we flustered them and proved that we came here to play. We had to come back as one, and we finished strong."
Sanders, whose five first-half points were a key morale boost for BHS, and Weybright each finished with seven points. Starting posts Courtney Bayles and Taylor Morris each had four and reserve guard Skyla Ruybal two.
"It's huge," Killough said, looking ahead to next week's IML District Tournament. "Not only a win, but the point spread? They came out and took care of business in the second half (winning it 34-9), and it's huge for them to have momentum like that."
