2A girls basketball semifinals: Holyoke, Sanford to meet in championship game

LOVELAND – There will be a new girls champion this year in Class 2A, as No. 2 seed Holyoke knocked out defending champion and No. 3 seed Limon, 45-34, in the semifinals Friday at the Budweiser Events Center. 

The Dragons used a dominating first quarter to take a commanding lead and never looked back as they advanced to just their second state title game and will face top-seeded Sanford Saturday looking for their first state championship. 

“As they are defending champs, it was just another motivation for us to go out there and get a quick start on them and just stomp on them as coach (John) Baumgartner likes to say,” Holyoke senior Kristin Vieselmeyer said. “Just having that mentality of they are a state championship team, that brought a lot of motivation to us.”

Limon scored the first four points of the game, but the Badgers wouldn’t score again in the opening period. Behind a pair of 3-pointers from Audrey Talavera and one from Elyce Talavera, the Dragons scored 18 unanswered points to take an 18-4 lead at the end of the first quarter. 

Holyoke continued to outscore Limon in the second quarter, ending the first half with an 11-3 run to take a 31-12 lead into halftime. 

“That’s kind of how we’ve done some things this year,” Baumgartner said. “We’ll give up some points early, but we knew we had to shoot the ball better than we did last night and they did. They came out ready to go and got to credit our kids, they didn’t flinch. We’ve played Limon before and we know how good of a basketball team that is and so it felt good to jump back on them and keep that lead in that first half.”

Coming out of halftime, the game was more balanced as Limon was able to cut into the Holyoke lead despite the Dragons still going on the attack. 

Led by six points from Jordyn Todna, the Badgers outscored the Dragons 13-10 and trailed 41-25 going into the fourth quarter. 

In the final period, Limon continued to push the Dragons, but the 16-point deficit with eight minutes to play was too much for the Badgers to overcome. 

Limon outscored Holyoke 9-5 in the final period, but the Dragons were able to make free throws down the stretch to keep the Badgers from posing any kind of a threat. 

“We were still in attack mode,” Baumgartner said. “We had a 20-point lead there in the third quarter, but in that fourth quarter, we knew just to take good shots, anything was going to be a layup or an easy shot like that. Then we knew they had to foul us, so the more clock we used, the better things would work out for us.”

It was the second time this season the Dragons defeated the Badgers, only this one meant much more. 

The win by Holyoke kept Limon from a chance to win its seventh state championship since 1998. 

“This has been our dream for about four years,” Vieselmeyer said. “It’s an awesome opportunity to be able to play for our team and our community.”

Vieselmeyer led the Dragons (24-1) with 12 points. Audrey Talavera added 11 and Elyce Talavera had 10. Brynlyn Owens led Limon (23-3) with nine points.

Holyoke and Sanford will tip off at 7 p.m. Saturday. 

No. 1 Sanford 42, No. 4 Rye 31

Top-seeded Sanford handed Rye its first loss of the season, but had to hold off the Thunderbolts in the closing minutes to do so. 

The Indians will look to win their first title since 2011 when they meet No. 2 seed Holyoke in Saturday’s championship game. 

Despite leading 16-8 at halftime and 31-22 going into the fourth quarter, Sanford was able to fend off a late rally by Rye. 

Stanford led by as many as 11 points in the fourth quarter, but with just under three minutes left, Rye had cut the Indians’ lead to three points at 34-31. 

A 3-pointer by Sanford’s Avryn Smith gave the Indians some breathing room at 37-31 and Asia Caldon made five of six free throws to seal the victory as Sanford scored the final eight points of the game. 

Defense and 3-point shooting were keys to Sanford’s victory. The Indians held Rye to eight first-half points and all 15 of Sanford’s third-quarter points came from long range. 

Stanford (25-1) was led in scoring by Asia Caldon, who had 19 points. Cheyenne Caldon added eight. Sydney Adamson led Rye (25-1) with 12. 

Rye will face Limon in the third-place game Saturday morning.