5A boys basketball Great 8 roundup: Chatfield in Final 4 for first time since 1996

(2) Chatfield 63, (4) Cherry Creek 55 (OT)

DENVER — It had been more than a decade since a Jeffco program reached the Final 4 of the Class 5A state boys basketball tournament.

Chatfield snapped that streak Saturday afternoon with a little drama and a lot of resiliency.

The Chargers forced overtime with a last-second free throw and then completely took over in OT, pulling away for a 63-55 victory over Cherry Creek in the Great 8 at the Denver Coliseum.

“The last 3 playoff games that we’ve played, we haven’t played very well and we’ve found ways to win,” Chatfield coach Stephen Schimpeler said. “We’ve found ways to win that were not necessarily areas that we’re best at, so that speaks very highly of them. This is a resilient group.”

Chatfield (23-2) advanced to the state semifinals for the first time since 1996 and will play either Overland on Friday at the Coors Events Center in Boulder.

The Chargers overcame a brilliant shooting performance from Cherry Creek senior Will Halfon, who scored 38 points on 15-of-24 shooting.

“He’s an incredible player, an incredible shooter,” said Chatfield senior Cameron Pearson, who shared the team lead of 18 points with Josh Frenette. “I tipped some of his shots and they were still going in. Hats off to him – he’s amazing.”

A back-and-forth game looked to belong to Chatfield, which led by eight early in the fourth quarter. The Bruins battled back, and after trading the lead a few times, Cherry Creek found itself up 50-49 in the final minute on an Amon Johnson follow-up bucket.

Pearson was fouled with 3.9 seconds remaining and hit his first free throw. He missed the second, grabbed the offensive rebound and just missed a jumper to force overtime.

It ultimately didn’t matter, as the Chargers were 5-of-6 shooting in OT. The team repeatedly drove inside, and Frenette had six of his 18 points in the extra session.

“We didn’t say anything in particular,” Pearson said. “It looked like we got a little more aggressive and it looked like we finished at the rim rather than falling away or settling for jump shots.

“It was like a whole mindset change almost — just a sense of urgency that this is it, man, this is it.”

Nine players scored for Chatfield. Pearson finished with nine rebounds and Frenette added eight.

“We had a lot of people step up,” Schimpeler said. “It wasn’t necessarily scoring, they were just kind of doing the little things. It truly was a team win.”

Dimitri Stanley grabbed 11 rebounds for the Bruins (16-10) and Hayden Parr had 10.

(1) Eaglecrest 69, (2) Regis Jesuit 57

Colbey Ross didn’t score often, but was he ever timely with his baskets.

The junior guard found himself in early foul trouble and was forced to the bench often, but Eaglecrest still came away with a 69-57 win over Regis Jesuit to advance to the 5A Final 4. The Raptors (24-2) will face Rangeview on Friday at the Coors Events Center in Boulder.

Ross was able to kickstart the Eaglecrest offense at the start of the third and fourth quarters by scoring early baskets. Each time he had just re-entered the game after sitting for an extended period of time because of foul trouble. They were baskets that the Raptors badly needed at each point in time.

“It was a great feeling because I know any game these guys are going to step up for me,” Ross said. “If I’m in foul trouble, if I’m not making shots, it’s these guys that make me better and help us win the game tonight.”

The game got off to a very fast pace that saw the Raiders (22-4) take a 31-30 lead into halftime. Sophomore Elijah Martinez, who came in averaging eight points per game, exploded in the first half where he scored 16 of his team-high 20 points.

But despite Martinez’s second-best scoring effort of the season (he scored 29 against ThunderRidge on Feb. 9) the Raiders failed to reach the Final 4 for the fifth-straight season.

“I can’t wait to be back next year,” Martinez said. “It was a team effort and we just couldn’t get it done today.”

It was the Raptors who were able to step up and use more of a team effort to earn their third Final 4 bid in the last four seasons. Eaglecrest won the 5A state championship in 2013 when they beat Denver East 63-44.

But just getting there required Raptors coach John Olander to adjust some things and hope that the Raptors could weather the storm of Ross being confined to the bench.

“(We had to) hang on and keep it as close as we can,” Olander said. “The good thing about this team and about Colbey is that he doesn’t have to score for us to be successful. Having his leadership helps get some of the other guys open, but we’ve played 11 guys all year long so we have guys with experience. I trusted the guys I had in there.”

And that trust paid off. The Raptors capped off the 5A Great 8 by hoisting a Final 4 trophy much to the delight of their fans. But their work is far from over and they’ll get back to it Monday along with the other four teams hoping to win a state title.

(1) Rangeview 75, (2) Cherokee Trail 64

Cherokee Trail Rangeview boys basketball

Whatever Rangeview needed Saturday afternoon, Elijah Reed was ready to deliver it as the Raiders fought to a 75-64 win over Cherokee Trail in the 5A Great 8.

A big 3-pointer to create some room on the scoreboard?

Reed’s got it.

Four consecutive free throws to give the Raiders (26-0) a comfortable lead in the third quarter?

Reed was the guy to step up and knock them down.

He’ll be the first to say that he’s not anything special. His team is a unit and Saturday was just his day to step up when needed.

“Any of our guys can be put in that situation or rise to the occasion,” he said. “We don’t have one guy that’s going to come up and do everything for us every single night. We just have pieces.”

The Raiders had five guys score in double figures to the team remain undefeated. For the Cougars (19-7), David Thornton led all scorers with 26.

Looking to fare better than the first meeting between the two teams back on Jan. 9 (a game in which Rangeview walked away with a 59-55 win), the Cougars jumped out to a quick 12-11 lead after the first quarter.

But after leaving their Sweet 16 game come down to the wire, the Raiders showed no desire for that to be the case. Reed, who had been held scoreless, went 3-3 from the field in the second quarter, including a big 3-pointer to push the Raiders lead to 25-18.

Once Rangeview grabbed ahold of that momentum, they weren’t going to let it go. They came out and scored 27 points in the third quarter, all but wrapping up a trip to the Coors Events Center.

“There’s just something about the third quarter,” Tyrei Randle said. “We like to make our mistakes early so when we get late in the game, we don’t have as many mistakes as we did to start the game.”

The win means that the Raiders still have a chance to complete their run at a perfect season. They know that the pressure is going to get turned up on Friday in the state semifinals.

“It’s been that way the whole season,” Reed said. “We’ve played a lot of great teams and we’ve prepared for those teams really well. We know that we’re not going to take a step back, we know that we can’t come out next week and not play how we play.”

(1) Overland 69, (2) Doherty 50

Overland Doherty boys basketball De'Ron Davis

De’Ron Davis was his usual powerful self in the paint Saturday night, throwing down multiple two-handed dunks.

But the 3-pointers that were falling for the 6-foot-10 Overland senior? That may have been a bit unexpected, at least for everyone outside of the Trailblazers.

Davis knocked down three 3-pointers on his way to a game-high 22 points, sending the defending Class 5A state champions back to the Final 4 for the third year in a row with a 69-50 victory over Doherty at the Denver Coliseum.

Overland (23-3) faces Chatfield on Friday at the Coors Events Center in Boulder for a berth in the 5A state championship game the next night.

“We’ve been hungry since Day 1,” Davis said. “All my teammates were back in the gym three days after we won state last year, preparing for this moment right now. We’re pretty hungry, and we’ll never try to settle. We want to be the best we can be.”

Davis was perfect from the field until missing his final two attempts of the fourth quarter. His performance from the perimeter included a 4-point play late in the second quarter that pushed the lead to 16 points.

“The big men didn’t respect my shot,” Davis said. “I caught it in rhythm and just held my follow through and just worked on my mechanics. Everything was just hitting.”

Davis added 10 rebounds and three blocks to his night. Jervae Robinson scored 16 points and Padiet Wang chipped in with 10.

As Doherty struggled from the floor in the first half – shooting 3-of-15 from the perimeter – Overland took advantage on the other end. The team built a 13-point lead at halftime, and though the Spartans (22-4) cut the lead to nine early in the third quarter, the shots simply weren’t falling with any consistency.

“That’s one thing our defensive pressure does. We don’t press a lot, we don’t do a lot of full-court stuff,” Trailblazers coach Danny Fisher said. “But in the half-court we are really, really in your face. Sometimes we benefit from that because it wears teams’ legs down.”

Overland shot 55 percent from the field through the first two quarters.

“We shot the ball really well in the first half, and that set the tone,” Fisher said. “That was really important for us to build on that lead.”

Brevin Brimble led Doherty with 16 points and Dalven Brushier added 13 points and nine rebounds.

Overland hadn’t had an opportunity to see much of Chatfield, but a victory over Centennial League foe Cherry Creek certainly commanded respect.

“For them to beat Creek, that says a lot in itself,” Fisher said. “It says how tough they are because Creek is a tough, hard-nosed team that you really have to be ready to grind out to play. That sounds like one of the teams in our league.”