Aizha Little gave two points to her Arts & Sciences team in Thursday's girls' District 5-A high school basketball game at Silverdale Baptist Academy. But she took a lot more away from the opposition.
The last thing Little took away was a potential game-winning half-court shot by Silverdale's Megan Lewis. Her block of the last-second heave made sure to preserve the Lady Patriots' 44-42 victory.
The teams came into the game in a three-way tie in the loss column for first place with Boyd-Buchanan, which was idle. CSAS (12-6, 3-1) is making up a postponed district game Monday at Copper Basin, then hosts Boyd-Buchanan on Friday.
Silverdale (15-7, 3-2) also has a game left with the Lady Buccaneers, but not until Feb. 5 in its next-to-last game. The district tournament is the week after.
"It was two good basketball teams," SBA coach Tim Thompson said of his team and the Lady Patriots. "There are no secrets between us. I can't take anything away from their girls. They played good. We came up a little short this time. We expect to see them again."
Although CSAS would not have won, at least in regulation, without Little's layup at the 30-second mark of the first quarter, her primary job was shadowing Lewis in the Lady Patriots' man-to-man defense. Lewis entered as a 15-point-per-game scorer and got loose for a 3-point goal a minute and a half into the game to give the Lady Seahawks a 5-2 lead. But she didn't score again.
"They're on the same AAU team, so she knows her pretty well," CSAS coach Zach Dragoo said of his decision to put Little on Lewis. "The best thing you can do on her is not cheat, and she doesn't cheat. You can't lose her for a second, going for steals."
Little did have some problems cramping in the fourth quarter, as did teammate Lennex Walker. Still, Dragoo stuck with a six-player rotation.
Silverdale was down by 13 points twice in the third quarter but battled back and went up 40-37 with less than six minutes to play. Emily Harkleroad scored 12 of her game-high 17 points in the second half, mostly on layups on runouts.
"We got tired," Dragoo said. "We got careless with our passes; we made mental mistakes; we were not getting back. It was like, 'Let's see how many ways we can give the game away.'"
Thompson, conversely, was perplexed by the first half, which ended with CSAS leading 28-17.
"I was upset a little at halftime," Thompson said. "Not at what we were doing wrong, just what we were not doing. We weren't playing with heart. We started doing that in the second half, and the score showed that."
The Lady Seahawks were ahead 42-41 from the 3:18 mark of the fourth quarter until Keturah Billen banked in a 3-pointer from the right side with 47 seconds to go. Those were her only points and proved to be the final margin.
As the remaining time played out, Silverdale didn't have enough team fouls to put the Lady Patriots in the bonus until three seconds were left. When Walker, who led CSAS with 15 points, missed the front end of the one-and-one, it set the stage for Little's block at the end.
Sarah McElvain had 14 points for CSAS. Crystal Ealey scored 10.
Rachel Sanders contributed 12 points for Silverdale.
Contact Kelley Smiddie at ksmiddie@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6653. Follow him at twitter.com/KelleySmiddie.