LCA girls survive, advance to third straight VIS Final Four

A battle between Bulldogs, Wednesday’s Virginia Independent Schools Division I girls basketball quarterfinal that pitted Liberty Christian Academy and visiting Norfolk Academy, turned into an all-out dogfight.

“I’ve coached basketball for 20 years and that might have been the ugliest game I’ve ever seen,” LCA coach Mike Morris said after his team’s 41-36 triumph. “Both teams were playing very aggressive defense, and the referees let it go a little bit (but) we came out on top.”

Freshman Edina Musa’s back-to-back steals in the final two and a half minutes of the fourth quarter helped clinch the victory, with the host Bulldogs (15-9) clinging to a 35-34 lead.

Musa, a freshman from Macedonia and the younger sister of former LCA standout Hanka Musa, stripped the ball out of the hands of Norfolk’s Riley Tata as she penetrated down the right side of the lane before Musa took it the length of the court for a left-handed layup.

Norfolk’s Dani Johnson countered Musa’s second steal by intercepting a pass into her lane and assisting Tata (10 points) for a fast-break score, trimming LCA’s advantage to 37-36 with 1:22 to play. But Claire Thompson and Musa assisted Raven Jefferson on a layup in the right side of the lane with 1:00 left and a 3-point attempt by Norfolk post player Krissy Gorsline from the right wing struck the front of the iron with 10 seconds to go.

After being fouled hard in the backcourt, LCA shooting guard Courtney Powell (nine points) sealed the victory, and her team’s third consecutive trip to the VIS Division I state Final Four, by hitting both free throws.

Powell had sustained another hard fall to the floor early in the third quarter, landing on her hip and elbow on a breakaway after taking a long outlet pass from Amber Tomlin. She appeared to be leveled by Johnson, though no foul was called.

“It was tough at times but we pulled together,” Powell said. “We did a good job down the stretch.”

On LCA’s previous possession, Tomlin, who missed two weeks with a knee injury, gave the Bulldogs their first lead since the first quarter when she wrestled away an offensive rebound and muscled her way through the lane for a putback and a 27-26 lead.

“Amber did really good in the second half,” Powell said. “It’s very good to have her back. When it gets tight, she really comes through for us. She’s our only senior post player.”

When Morris watched 10th-seeded Norfolk Academy (11-13) hold sixth-seeded St. Catherine’s to 22 points in a first-round upset win on Tuesday, he formulated a gameplan to attack its 1-3-1 zone defense with Tomlin.

“That’s why I started Gena (Penick), so I could start two low posts and we can really pound it,” he said. “But they did a really good job of rotating that big girl (Gorsline) down.”

Tomlin failed to finish a number of point-blank opportunities in the first half, due in part to Norfolk’s defenders.

“Our game’s all about the defense,” Norfolk junior co-captain Holley Beasley said.

“We only play offense so we can go play defense again,” added Gorsline, the Bulldogs’ other captain.

Beasley, who was thrown to the floor on a few occasions after clashing in the lane with LCA freshman forward Skyler Womack, tied Tata for Norfolk’s scoring lead with 10 points.

“It was definitely one of the more physical games we’ve had all season,” Gorsline said.

“We did a good job of standing our ground, and fighting back,” Beasley added.

“We weren’t expected to get here so it was good to put a fight up against this great team that they have here,” Gorsline added. “I hope they do well.”

Third-seeded LCA (15-9) plays second-seeded Flint Hill (21-4), a 30-point winner over Bishop O’Connell on Wednesday, in Friday’s second semifinal at Benedictine in Richmond, set for 8:30 p.m.

That will be another battle of the Bulldogs, against a Flint Hill team that knocked them out in the 2008 semifinal round. Last year, LCA beat Bishop O’Connell in the Final Four before falling to Paul VI, this season’s No. 1 seed, on its home court in the state championship game.

“They’ll be a tough opponent,” said LCA shooting guard Jacklyn Toews, who led all scorers with 12 points, sinking three 3-pointers for the game and three free throws with less than three seconds left in the first half, trimming Norfolk’s lead to 24-21. “It should be pretty evenly matched. They’re beatable. We’ve got to keep our intensity up and shoot well and play the defense we’re capable of. We play really aggressive and really physical defense and try to stop the ball.”