Miami Country Day girls' basketball survives rare close call at state final four

Miami Herald

27-02-2025

Miami Country Day's girls' basketball team has spent over a decade annually coming to Lakeland and often decimating the competition at the state final four.
That didn't happen on Thursday afternoon.
The Spartans found themselves in a down-to-the-wire battle for a change as they squared off with Fort Myers Evangelical Christian in a Class 2A state semifinal at the RP Funding Center.
While the struggle was something rare for Miami Country Day, its resilience wasn't.
And it's why the result remained a familiar one for the Spartans.
After falling behind by as many as 12 in the first quarter, Miami Country Day clawed its way back thanks to its signature brand of aggressive defense and squeaked past Evangelical Christian, 37-35, to clinch a return trip to the state finals.
Country Day's second-half turnaround secured it the opportunity to chase its 10th state championship in the past 12 seasons on Saturday when it faces Jacksonville Providence (24-6) in the Class 2A final at 1 p.m.
The Spartans have defeated Providence three times in Lakeland - in the 2017 state final and each of the past two seasons in the semifinal round.
'We got off to a rough start. We weren't hitting our shots and weren't playing our defense,' said Spartans guard Kamie Ellis, who led Country Day with 14 points and four steals. 'But we've been through a lot of situations with our tough schedule and been through games like this and fought back. We don't stop and we have good leaders. We just came out flat. Offensively, we couldn't get a flow, but we said we weren't going home today.'
Ellis' three-pointer with 50.7 seconds remaining put Miami Country Day ahead 35-33.
Some tough defense in the paint kept Evangelical Christian's Nalah Smith from converting a layup and Areille Marc from making a put back attempt with 31 seconds left.
Spartans sophomore guard Kori Edge, who finished with seven points, six assists and four steals, proceeded to make a pair of free throws for Country Day with 18.3 seconds left.
The Sentinels' Kellisia Grant drew a foul with 5.8 seconds remaining and hit both free throws to cut the Spartans' lead to two. But Country Day played keep away long enough until Arianna Robinson went to the foul line at the other end with 1.1 seconds left. She missed both free throws, but Evangelical Christian was unable to do anything with the ball after rebounding the second miss to even attempt a game-winning shot.
'It just took our energy,' Edge said. 'We got down in the first quarter and got discouraged so we talked at halftime and it was really about bringing the energy and playing the way we normally play.'
Miami Country Day (19-11) won by its narrowest margin ever at the state final four and it was only the second triumph in 19 victories at state since 2013 decided by single digits.
Spartans coach Ochiel Swaby, who has led the Spartans to all nine of their state titles, said the poor offensive performance is nothing new for his team this season.
'Today's game was a microcosm of our season,' Swaby said. 'We don't have enough of an offensive identity. We've had some halves and quarters like the first half today. Nothing that happened today was out of character. We've had trouble scoring the basketball at times all season, but we just had to speed up the game on defense and that's what helped us.'
The Spartans made only 1 of their first 11 shots and shot a dismal 5 of 29 from the field in the first half and trailed 19-12 at halftime.
But Miami Country Day's defensive efforts held the Sentinels (22-8), who also won a state title last season, to only 6 of 27 shooting in the first half to keep the game close.
The shots started coming when Edge swished a three-pointer and Miami Country Day sped up the tempo with full court pressure.
It sparked a 13-0 Country Day run and gave the Spartans their first lead with 6:16 left in the third quarter on an Ellis three-pointer.
'We started on the wrong foot, but we made sure in the second half we didn't fall into a deeper hole we couldn't climb out of,' said Country Day sophomore guard Jalynn Belton, who has 17 offers from Power conference schools and over 20 from Division-I programs. 'We tried to encourage our younger players. I trusted we'd make the shots.'