And on Jan. 2, they saw who they needed to be. Minster came to Xenia and beat the Knights 39-38 with tenacious defense. And Combs knew his athletic team, full of regional tournament soccer players, had more to give on defense.
“Watching how Minster played us and how difficult it was just to run an offense, I went, ‘We can do that,’” Combs said. “I didn’t think we played our best game, but, man, they showed us a lot. So thanks to Minster.”
The change was evident in Saturday’s Division VII district final at Tecumseh High School. The Knights harassed Jackson Center from one end of the court to the other, deflected passes, created steals and contested shots to pull away in the second half for a 36-26 victory.
“Our defense has been our focus all week,” said senior and leading scorer Ali Solomon. “Our defense and rebounding is what really pushed us ahead, and our ball pressure for sure.”
The Knights led 19-18 at halftime, but they only allowed two points in the third quarter and two points in the fourth until the final 90 seconds. That second half was a culmination of what the Knights realized after the Minster loss.
“The day after we lost, our focus was we can defend like they did and just get after people,” Solomon said. “Our mantra has been to contest everything and get up in people’s grills because we know we can play like that.”
The Knights won their first district title since 2021 and will face Mississinawa Valley, a 45-44 overtime winner over Russia, at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday in the region semifinals at Vandalia Butler.
Fortunately for the Knights, their defense travels. Because, for a second straight game, they struggled to shoot the ball well. And, just as fortunately, 5-foot-10 sophomore Autumn Allport picked a good day to have one of her best games with 16 points.
“Autumn was fantastic, and she’s been a little down on herself, just trying to find where she fits and her rhythm,” Combs said. “I’m so proud of her because you don’t know when that’s going to happen, but she stayed in it the whole time. She’s tried, she’s taken the tough shots, and so it was great to see them finally fall for her.”
Allport’s 3-pointer just before halftime pushed the Knights' lead to 19-15. Then late in the third she made a difficult shot in the paint and scored off a turnover to push the lead to 26-20.
“She hit those shots and it really boosted our momentum, and our confidence skyrocketed after that,” Solomon said. “She had an awesome game.”
Then Solomon, who averages 13 a game, made a 3-pointer to start the fourth for a 29-20 lead. Because of the defense, the lead was safe.
Jackson Center surprised Combs with a 2-3 zone defense that made the Knights rely on outside shooting. He hadn’t seen the Tigers play zone on game film and didn’t practice for it.
“She obviously got the Covington tape (from the previous game) and watched us brick it for an hour,” Combs said. “I thought our kids handled it well. What we’re trying to do is just get good shots, and I thought we got good shots. And you could see that the game separated when we made a couple.”
Fort Loramie 65, Middletown Christian 31: Fort Loramie raced to a 31-3 lead and made history Saturday in the second Division VII district final at Tecumseh.
The Redskins became the first girls program in Ohio to reach 1,000 wins. In 54 years, they have been to 12 state tournaments, won four state titles (including last year) and lost only 283 games.
“It’s not this team that did that,” said head coach Carla Siegel, who has been a part of about 700 of the wins as a player, assistant coach and now head coach for 26 years. “It’s 54 years of Fort Loramie girls basketball. It’s five head coaches, probably 25 assistant coaches and I counted today 295 players. So it’s all of them combined. It’s mothers of these players and it’s aunts of these players that made that happen.”
Avery Brandewie scored 22 points and Victoria Mescher scored 20 to lead the Redskins into Wednesday’s regional semifinal at 6 p.m. at Butler against Delaware Christian.
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