RISING TO THE NEXT LEVEL

After sharing the District 20-1A title with defending champion Blum, Meridian Lady Jackets win Bi-District playoff over Lingleville, fall to Richland Springs in Area

After advancing to the Class 1A postseason for the second straight season by sharing the District 20-1A title with the defending champion Blum Lady Bobcats, the Meridian Lady Jackets took with one step further with an impressive 31-24 Bi-District playoff victory over the Lingleville Lady Cardinals last Tuesday.

Despite trailing 12-5 going into halftime, Meridian outscored Lingleville, 14-4, in the third period before putting the win away in the fourth as junior Journey Stauffer led the Lady Jackets with nine points, followed by Mariana Paniagua with eight as well as seniors Canyon Stauffer and Eve Dirkse with six apiece.

“With us drawing Lingleville, we felt like we had an edge seeing as how we had already played them in the Santo tournament,” Meridian girls basketball first-year head coach Adan Reyes said. “So we were aware of their strengths and weaknesses, and we also knew what we did right and what we did wrong against them.

“They are a scrappy team that’s going to hit you with everything they got. We didn’t play well offensively in the first half. Luckily for us, on the defensive side we were able to hold them at bay to only a seven-point lead. In the second half, we knew we were going to have to speed the game up. So,we just got into our press and were able to get some quick buckets and build a lead closing the third. In the fourth, we were able to continue building onto the lead and finally giving ourselves some breathing room.”

But in the Area Playoff matchup last Friday in Hamilton, Meridian met its match as the seventh-ranked Richland Springs Lady Coyotes (29-6) ran away with a convincing 36-18 win.

“Richland Springs is a program that is rich in tradition of success and winning,” Reyes said. “They’ve been playing great basketball all year and are hungry to make a deep playoff run.

“Being co-district champs and winning the bi-district playoff game is definitely a stepping stone heading into next year’s realignment as we make the transition into 2A. It gives us some reassurance that we can play with the good ones as there is sure to be rough patches early on in the new classification and district.”

In the regular season finale against Iredell, the Lady Jackets (11-1 in district, 16-17 overall) clinched a share of the District 20-1A title with a solid 47-37 home victory over the Iredell Lady Dragons. Canyon Stauffer led Meridian with 12 points, followed by Dyna Potter with 10 along with Paniagua and Journey Stauffer with nine each.

“Iredell came out strong and determined to get the win,” Reyes said. “We just stuck to what we do well and played good team defense and were able to keep them at bay on the defensive side. On the offensive side, we struggled a bit, missing opportunities to go ahead and put them away until the fourth quarter.”

With the win over Iredell (7-5, 14-10), the Lady Jackets moved on to a postseason-seeding tiebreaker against co-district champion Blum (11-1, 15-6) and came up short, 39-32, led by Journey Stauffer with 11 points.

“Going into the tiebreaker game with Blum, we knew it was going to be a fight amongst the heavyweights,” Reyes said. “We made a few adjustments, and we executed them well. Blum did a great job of making adjustments. But in the end, our kryptonite of struggling from the free throw line caused us to come up short.

“At the start of the season, our goal was to finish at least in second place. We just wanted to keep it realistic. And being my first year as head coach, to come in and start talking about winning a district championship is something drastic. So, we decided to go for something we felt was realistic, which again was finishing second.

“Finishing as co-champs is always great. But I think that winning it this year is even more important because it plays an important role as we make the transition into 2A next year.”