Championship DNA.
When the Holy Cross girls basketball team needed championship caliber plays down the stretch of their All “A” Classic state championship game with Pikeville, they delivered and are headed home from Corbin with the title in a 56-55 dogfight.
“It’s championship DNA,” Indians coach Ted Arlinghaus said. “These girls just fight and fight and fight. We hang our hat on defense and that’s what we did at the end to win it.”
A dogfight is putting in lightly. The Indians needed every ounce of grit to pull this one out. They trailed by seven late in the third and Pikeville led for the majority. Miyah Wimzie’s layup with 1:11 left gave the Indians a 53-52 lead they would not surrender.
It happened to be on a play that was aided by the 2023 Miss Kentucky Volleyball winner, Julia Hunt, tapping an inbounds pass to Wimzie for the layup. The volleyball instincts kicked in.
“It’s usually when teams double team me like they did there. We did it in practice one time and kind of just stuck with it,” Hunt said.
Hunt’s game was nothing short of extraordinary. Her final tally was 18 points, seven rebounds and most notably eight blocked shots. Her shot blocking prowess helped make a difference down the stretch, the last one giving the Indians possession in a one-point game with less than 40 seconds to play.
She’d then clinch the game with 2.5 seconds to play on two free throws to make it 56-52.
“It feels amazing when you work this hard, it’s very rewarding,” Hunt said. “There’s not a feeling like it. It was fun with my teammates this week, but we came down here to win this and that’s exactly what we did.”
Trinity Rowe, who was phenomenal herself on the Pikeville side with 21 points and five assists, hit a 3-pointer as time expired, but it was too little, too late.
The victory for the Indians clinched back-to-back All “A” state championships for them, their third in program history, also winning in 2015.
Aaliyah Hayes, Aniyah Carter, Miyah Wimzie and Julia Hunt were named to the All “A” tournament team, Hunt claiming MVP honors in back-to-back seasons.
The game didn’t come without some adversity for the Indians as DMyah Williams went down with an injury in the second half. She had recently returned from a knee injury that sidelined her for the first half of the season. She left the floor in pain and was carried off.
INDIANS 56, PANTHERS 55
PIKEVILLE — 16-10-16-13 — 55
HOLY CROSS — 14-9-15-18 — 56
Scoring
Pikeville (55) — Rowe 21, Whited 11, Thornsbury 9, Jackson 7, Theiss 4, Alvin 3
Holy Cross (56) –Hunt 18, Hayes 10, Nelson 9, Wimzie 8, Carter 7, Williams 4
Game Stats
Field Goals: Pikeville 20/46, Holy Cross 20/42
3-Pointers: Pikeville 8/22, Holy Cross 4/10
Free Throws: Pikeville 7/12, Holy Cross 12/19
Rebounds: Pikeville 27, Holy Cross 25
Assists: Pikeville 14, Holy Cross 9
Turnovers: Pikeville 13, Holy Cross 10
Steals: Pikeville 6, Holy Cross 8
Fouls: Pikeville 16, Holy Cross 12
Records: Pikeville 16-3, Holy Cross 19-5