No. 4 Beavercreek defeated No. 3 Wayne 46-32 Monday at Fairborn’s Skyhawk Arena to advance to a Division I district final game.
“The kids are just really locked in on the game plans of what we want to do defensively and offensively,” Beavercreek head coach Aric Seilhamer said.
Beavercreek will face the South’s No. 1-seed, Milford, on Saturday at either Princeton or Fairfield High School at a yet to be determined time.
It has been a struggle for the Beavers to stay above .500 this season with multiple three game winning and losing streaks on its ledger. Sitting at 6-7 overall on Jan. 12, a pair of road wins followed that have kickstarted a late push to near the top of the Greater Western Ohio Conference standings.
Beavercreek (13-10) suffered another three-game skid against three of the best teams in the Dayton area, Carroll, Fairmont and Springboro, and came out the other side feeling good. They finished third in the league and now own a four-game win streak following Monday’s tournament win.
“I think it’s good confidence for the kids,” Seilhamer said. “If you look in the scorebook everybody scored today. Everybody was a contributor and that’s what I love about our team. If you look at the GWOC stats, we don’t have anybody averaging 15 or 20, so it’s team wins.”
Senior Lana Srbinovski led the way with 11 points, sophomore Dani Bondurant scored 10 and sophomore Cameron king added six. All six other members of the roster had between two and five points.
Beavercreek and Wayne split its regular season meetings. Both teams won at home by four points.
It was a much faster start for the Beavers on Monday in jumping out to a 15-5 advantage and leading by double-digits for most of the remainder of the game.
Trailing by 16 near the end of the third quarter, Wayne’s full court pressure began to slowly earn the Warriors a chance to get back in the game. The deficit didn’t get back under 10 points until there was 2:35 remaining in the fourth, but Wayne didn’t score again for the remainder of the game.
“The last few games we’ve had, we had some great starts and I think with these young kids, Lana’s our senior, she had a little huddle and got the kids together, and I think that they have the confidence when the game gets tight the start was good for them because we can get a little nervous down the stretch,” Seilhamer said.
Wayne sophomore NaRiya Goddard carried her team through three quarters, scoring 18 of her team’s 21 total points, before ending with a game-high 20. Sophomore Makenna Pride hit Wayne’s only three-pointer of the game to start the fourth quarter.
Wayne finished its season 11-12 overall.
Beavercreek could have sank a few more free throws during the fourth quarter — shooting 4 of 13 from the charity stripe — to help its own cause but it did not matter on this night.
Milford may be a different matter. Any help could needed against the top ranked team from Cincinnati that made 10 threes in its tournament win against Fairfield Monday and got a double-double from 6-foot-3 junior Kylie Perone.
“I know that they shoot the three, they got a big center and a good coach,” Seilhamer said. “So, hey, we’re gonna try to go get the upset and we’ll see.”
Fairmont continues undefeated run
No. 1 Fairmont had no issues dispatching No. 6 Springfield 65-32 in the first game of Monday’s session at Fairborn.
Senior Kaylah Thornton and sophomore Janiyah Hargrave scored 19 points, respectively.
There were few signs of flow with constant whistles disrupting the action. The two teams combined to commit 24 fouls in the first half and 45 for the game. Fairmont shot 28-for-39 from the free throw line as a team.
“Kinda knew it was going to be that way,” Fairmont head coach Jeremey Finn said. “They are very physical. The last two times we’ve played them was very physical and we just needed to keep our composure and play basketball the right way and we did a good job of that while [Springfield] did a good job too. Playing a GWOC team game one is always a battle.”
Fairmont (23-0) began the game with a 16-2 run and only allowed one made field goal against in the initial 11:30 of the game.
Springfield senior Day’veonna Boynton scored 10 points in the loss. The Wildcats finish the season 11-12 overall.
Fairmont’s district final opponent will be No. 6 Mason from the South section of the draw. The game will be back Saturday at Fairborn at a time to be determined.
About the Author
