The Philomath High School girls basketball team came through in the final seconds to pull out a 44-39 victory over the host school Friday night at Marshfield in the semifinals of the South Coast Les Schwab Tournament.
The Warriors (4-1) will face 3A unbeaten Coquille at 4 p.m. Saturday in the championship game. The Red Devils (7-0) reached the tournament finale with victories of 50-23 over Hidden Valley and 41-32 over Scappoose.
Philomath had leads of 9-6 after the first quarter and 22-16 at halftime and in the third quarter, the Warriors had a double-digit lead at one point. But the home-court Pirates rallied, cut their deficit to six by the start of the fourth quarter and tied the game late.
With the score knotted at 39, Philomath hit the go-ahead basket when junior Zoee Howard drove to the hoop off an in-bounds pass from sophomore Emily Taunisila and scored underneath on a shot off the glass.
Marshfield couldn’t do much down the stretch except foul PHS players and watch the Warriors drop 3 of 4 free throws — two by senior Ahnika Tryon with 10.1 seconds left and one by Taunisila with 3.1 seconds on the clock.
“We played really good team basketball … Marshfield is a good well-coached team; everyone contributes,” PHS coach Ben Silva said. “(Anneka) Steen was all over the place on both ends of the ball. Tryon did a good job in transition. Zoee did a good job finishing at the hoop.”
Tryon finished with a team-high 12 points, a performance that included three baskets and 6 for 7 from the foul line. Steen scored 10 points on five baskets. Howard and Taunisila each added nine.
Marshfield kept the game close with strong 3-point shooting. The Pirates hit 5 of 10 shots from beyond the arc. Philomath countered with a strong 11 of 13 foul-shooting performance.
