Sammy Curtis scored a layup against Oroville on her way to a 26-point performance, the highest single-game total this year for the Lady Lions. Curtis is second behind Jadyn Mitchell in team scoring.
It was a long way to go for a win, but the Liberty Bell High School girls’ basketball team made the trek to Hanford worth it with a hard-fought 46-44 win over DeSales in the District 5/6 2B playoffs last Saturday (Feb. 9).
Because of snowstorms that made travel hazardous, the Lady Lions spent Saturday night in the Hanford gym before returning home on Sunday.
The win over DeSales sets the Lady Lions up for the next round of play at a much closer venue. They will travel to Chelan High School on Friday (Feb. 15) for a semi-final matchup with Tri-Cities Prep, tipping off at 5:30 p.m. A win would send Liberty Bell into the championship game at Chelan on Saturday (Feb. 16). A loss would relegate them to the losers’ bracket on Saturday, with a chance to take third or fourth. Either way, the Lady Lions will advance to state, as the top five finishers will move on.
Tri-Cities will pose another challenge, having beaten Waterville-Mansfield, 63-34, to advance to the semi-finals against Liberty Bell. The Lady Lions split their league games with Waterville-Mansfield this season.
If Liberty Bell gets past Tri-Cities, it may face Brewster or Lake Roosevelt for the District 5/6 championship — two league foes that the Lady Lions also split their games with during the regular season.
Earlier last week, Liberty Bell finished league play with a 61-25 win over visiting Oroville, giving the Lady Lions a 13-3 league record and a second-place tie with Lake Roosevelt. Liberty Bell won a tie-breaker process and so had a bye in the first round of district play, while Lake Roosevelt had to beat Liberty Christian and Columbia (Burbank) to advance to the semi-finals.
Against DeSales, junior Tommie Ochoa had her best game of the year in leading the Lady Lions with 20 points, including six of seven three-point attempts. Ochoa was playing for the first time since her father, Daniel Ochoa, was hospitalized with a heart attack the previous week (see accompanying story).
“Tommie kept us in the game,” Liberty Bell coach Stephanie Mitchell said. “This was
another great team effort. The girls worked hard on running their offense and finding the open player.”
Ochoa also had four steals. Freshman Jadyn Mitchell was held under 10 points for the first time this season with seven, but cleaned the board with 11 rebounds and rejected five DeSales shots. Sophomore Sammy Curtis had seven points and six rebounds, junior Ali Palm had six rebounds and freshman Destiny Ferreira contributed five assists to go with five rebounds.
Against Oroville, Liberty Bell jumped to a 22-4 first-quarter lead and never looked back. Curtis converted Oroville turnovers into a flurry of layups on her way to 26 points, the highest output for any Lady Lion this season. Jadyn Mitchell added 20 points, the sixth time she has scored 20 or more points this year.
With the wins over Oroville and DeSales, Liberty Bell’s record stands at 17-4 for the season.
Liberty Bell 46, DeSales 44
Jadyn Mitchell 7, Madi Surface 2, Ali Palm 5, Destiny Ferreira 5, Sammy Curtis7, Tommie Ochoa 20
Liberty Bell 61, Oroville 25
Oroville 4 9 8 4 25
Liberty Bell 22 18 13 8 61
Sammy Curtis 26, Jadyn Mitchell 20, Madi Surface 5, Mckenna Ott 4, Ali Palm 3, Hailey Damman 3
Scoring through 21 games: Jadyn Mitchell 334, Sammy Curtis 267, Tommie Ochoa 112, Madi Surface 108, Ali Palm 108, Hannah Bakke 69, Destiny Ferreira 64, Hailey Damman 62, Mckenna Ott 12, Shae Taylor 8
