Lincoln County stood stunned along the sidelines as the final buzzer went off and they found themselves on the losing end of a 59-42 score to No. 4 seed Agassi Prep in the semifinals of the Southern Division III League tournament last Friday at Chaparral High in Las Vegas.
It was also one of those unusual situations where the last team you play in the regular season is the first team you play in the league playoffs.
The Lady Lynx (23-4) played Agassi Prep just a week earlier in Panaca and earned a hard fought 56-44 win to and finished as the No. 1 seed into the four-team league tournament.
Lincoln had two double-digit wins over Agassi in their two league meetings, but this time the outcome was different. “We got outplayed in that fourth quarter, did some things and made some mistakes that are uncharacteristic of us,” said Lynx coach Ken Thornock.
As a result, Agassi Prep went on a 22-8 run in the final period.
Sophomore Destiny Rover and freshman Sharmayne Finley led the Stars with 19 and 18 points respectively to win their first trip to the state tournament.
However, Agassi (13-6) will be the No. 2 seed from the southern division as they lost 54-48 in the Saturday championship to defending state champion White Pine. They will meet northern champ Incline (19-5) at the Lawlor Center in Reno today at 2:30.
“I don’t think we ever got in sync most of the night,” Thornock noted, “but we were down only by three at the end of the third quarter, and I didn’t think we were out of it for as bad as we played.”
But Agassi just kept building on the lead and Lincoln did not respond. “Defensively, we were not playing as hard as I felt we should have been,” Thornock said. “They (Agassi) took advantage of it and played really hard. Bottom line: Agassi played a really good game, and we did not, and late in the game we got in a bit of a panic mode and were doing those uncharacteristic things. We had a good week of practice, and had prepared well, watched film, etc. We just got outplayed.”
