Stonebridge Cavs SportsBlog*

the girls contended well for all four quarters but fell 41-30 in the state semis. Great effort. Had chance to win late. More later…

OK… It’s morning now and I think these girls did a fantastic job this year. Truth be told, we played the best team remaining in the tournament yesterday and we could have beaten them. Consider this: our opponent scored 92 points on Thursday and we held them to 41 points yesterday.  We beat them on the boards; our defense did an excellent job of keeping them out of any rhythm.

And we came storming back in the fourth quarter. Our strong contingent of SBS fans made quite a racket which (perhaps!) helped induce turnovers by our opponent on three successive possessions — okay, the girls get 99% of the credit! We cut it to four or five with about 2:30 remaining and had the ball. A break here or there and we’re playing today in the finals.

What a great bunch of girls, and the prospects for next year are very, very strong.

Hey, let’s use this thread to offer some words of thanks to Ryan and Julius for representing SBS so well in their excellent play and tremendous character this basketball season! Just click on “comment.”

Here’s the Va-Pilot’s story, online.

Girls boxscore:

Intro to the story:

By DAN COOLEY Special to The Virginian-Pilot For the first time, StoneBridge played host for both the boys and girls quarterfinals in the state private school basketball tournament as the higher seeds.

testing a remote post from the iPhone. This is cool (not as cool as the iPhone, but still cool).

First round of the state tournament takes place today at the SBS gym — home of the best lighting on the southside, the most energized fans and the cool second tier with the snazzy snack bar!

Girls play  Wakefield at 5:30 — note the early starting time

Boys play Tidewater Academy at 7:00.

SBS fans will be treated to two home playoff games this Thursday. First the girls will play at 5:30 followed by the boys game. OUr girls are ranked second in the state after we rolled through the Metro Conference tournament. The boys are ranked fourth and as defending state champions are surely one of the teams to beat.

Big possibilities for exciting games on Friday and Saturday, but first things first — we need two big wins on Thursday and lots of fan support!

If you missed Saturday’s spectacular Metro Conference finals games, here’s a rundown. What a thrill to be in the packed PCS gym with StoneBridge fans certainly comprising the largest contingent.

Our girls were awesome. They basically dominated from start to finish over Broadwater and turned what was expected to be a close contest into a 30-point blowout. We were quicker, smarter, more disciplined, more aggressive and just plain better. Coach Rowe and the team seem to be peaking at just the right time. Congrats, girls! A good primer for the state tournament.

I think I can speak for our entire section of StoneBridge fans in saying we are all very thrilled to see our boys play so hard and so well against Atlantic Shores. When we went from down 12 to within 3 in the course of about 2 minutes in the fourth quarter, it looked like we were going to pull of a tremendous upset against a team that is one of the favorites to win Division II states. The difference came down to a no-call on a drive by Ryan Barbosa — it sure looked like he got fouled. A whistle there would have changed the game — AS’s star player would have fouled out and Ryan would have sunk two freebies to make it a one-point game with all the pressure on Shores.

Kudos to Coach Cal and the staff. What a difference from the first time we faced Shores. I loved it that we played straight-up man-to-man just about the entire game. Despite being sick all week, Julius was spectacular. Wes hit some big shots and played his usual tough D. Brian really stepped up and had the toughest defensive assignment. Our big guys all played big. And as always Ryan made big shot after big shot to keep us close. It’s really quite a treat to watch Ryan.