Lady Braves get job done in overtime

She admitted to being tired afterward, but it was Adiya Jones who in the end wore down the Adna Lady Pirates.

Jones, like the La Conner High defense, never rested on Saturday — scoring a game-high 28 points to help the Lady Braves seal a 49-43 Regional Round verdict in overtime and earn a second straight State Tournament berth.

“I’m pretty tired,” the 5’9” junior forward said after her dominant performance at the Mount Vernon High gym. “But more than that, I’m excited. I can’t wait to go to Spokane. I hope we can go far there.”

For a few anxious moments, though, it appeared undefeated La Conner might not make it out of Skagit County.

Adna led 42-40 and had star point guard Regyn Gaffney at the line shooting a pair of free throws with 1:25 remaining in regulation.

Gaffney, who had buried a clutch outside jumper earlier in the fourth quarter, surpris-ingly missed both charity tosses.

Then Adna’s leading scorer, junior wing Shanay Dotson, saw her floater slide off the iron on the Lady Pirates’ ensuing possession.

That left just enough time for Jones to send the loser-out game into an extra session.

She worked inside for the tying bucket at the :15 mark.

The Lady Braves defense, which forced 21 Adna turnovers on the afternoon, did the rest.

La Conner shut down Adna over the last 3:15, yielding just a lone foul shot by Grace Elliot late in overtime.

The Lady Braves, meanwhile, scored seven points in OT and forced a fifth and final foul from Gaffney, the sparkplug for Adna’s fast-paced attack.

Kamea Pino gave La Conner the lead for good, at 43-42, with a free throw. Jones and Anna Cook each followed with baskets in the paint. Nakiya Edwards added two insurance foul shots in the waning seconds.

With the win, La Conner kept intact its unblemished ledger, improving to 23-0.

None of those previous wins was as dramatic as this one, however.

Adna led several times by four points in the second half, including 40-36 with under 3 minutes left in the fourth period.

Two scores by Cook — one on a sweet 6-foot hook shot — knotted the count at 40-40.

Gaffney calmly answered with an 18-footer that regained the lead for Adna.

Her steal just seconds later, which led to a two-shot intentional foul, literally put La Conner’s perfect season on the line.

The missed foul shots made possible the Lady Braves’ escape but don’t tell the whole story.

La Conner forced repeated Adna miscues and effectively thwarted the Lady Pirates’ half-court offense in the fourth quarter.

Nor did Adna ever figure out Jones, who had 15 points by intermission.

She gave credit to her team-mates, particularly Cook, whose interior passing from the high post was indeed crisp.

“We did a good job running our high-low offense,” Jones said. “It’s really great playing with Anna.”

And now they’ll get to team up at least twice — and perhaps three times more — at the Spokane Arena starting Thursday.