In a high-octane overtime thriller, Andrew Crawford and Tommy Wight refused to let ThunderRidge lose.
The Grizzlies topped Continental League rival Rock Canyon, 62-60, in the Class 6A Great 8 on Thursday at the Denver Coliseum. After the Jaguars railed to force OT, Crawford’s dish to Wight for the game-winning lay-up with five seconds left was the difference.
ThunderRidge’s win avenged its 48-44 home loss to Rock Canyon earlier in the season and propelled the four-time state champion Grizzlies back into next weekend’s Final Four.
“All game on those high ball screens, I would come off them and have nothing there,” Crawford said of the final bucket. “I told Tommy at halftime to start diving to the rim, and he probably got six buckets on it (in the second half and OT).
“They beat us on our home court, in a rivalry game, sold-out gym. We wanted to come back and get our revenge, so that’s what we did.”
Crawford, a CU commit widely regarded as the state’s top player in the Class of 2024, finished with 14 points and seven assists. Wight, a Point Loma pledge, poured in a game-high 23 points while the Grizzlies’ other top senior playmaker, Charlie Spann, scored 10.
Rock Canyon had a chance to tie, or win, the game after Wight’s final bucket. The Jaguars hurriedly pushed the ball up the floor but couldn’t get a shot off, giving the raucous ThunderRidge faithful the final say over the Canyon Crazies amid a strong turnout for both student sections.
The overtime dramatics came after the Jaguars, who faced a five-point deficit with under a minute to play in the fourth, clawed back. Rock Canyon freshman Jacob David hit a three with 26 seconds left to pull the Jaguars within two, and after Crawford missed one of his two free throws, Jaguars junior Kasen Lehman was fouled on a three-point attempt with 5.9 seconds left.
Macoy Terry (5) of Rock Canyon Jaguars drives against Andrew Crawford (42) and Ryan Doyle (1) of ThunderRidge Grizzlies during the second half of the Grizzlies’ 62-60 win in the Colorado state high school basketball tournament Great 8 at the Denver Coliseum on Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
Lehman made all three under pressure, and ThunderRidge’s final possession of regulation came up empty.
“I was questioning our last play in the fourth, and why we (couldn’t score), because they did a good job of defending Charlie,” ThunderRidge head coach Joe Ortiz said. “We could’ve done something different, but we didn’t have any timeouts.”
The theme of a back-and-forth game continued into the extra frame in the latest get-your-popcorn chapter of a coaching rivalry between the mentor (Ortiz) and the protege (Rock Canyon head coach Kent Grams), as the latter came up in the ThunderRidge system as a youngster and was part of the Grizzlies’ first title team in 2002.
Even in defeat, Grams admits he’d “still run through a wall for (Ortiz),” while the elder coach acknowledged the emotions that come into play whenever the two have faced each other over Grams’ 12-year tenure at Rock Canyon.
“It’s tough because I don’t want to see him lose,” Ortiz said. “There’s still a weirdness to it. A lot of alumni come to our games just to see us go against each other. I’m like, ‘Quit that. Don’t make it about us.’ And I know Kent is the same way.”
The Jaguars finished with four scorers in double digits, led by senior Hudson Ellwood’s 14 points, while Lehman had 13, David had 12 and senior Macoy Terry had 11.
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“We were so close to making one extra play, and we didn’t,” Grams said. “We’ve got to overcome that (as a program), and someday, we will. We just didn’t make enough plays down the stretch. … And Andrew Crawford was way more aggressive in this game than he was in the first game.”
While Rock Canyon’s season ends in Denver Coliseum heartbreak for a second straight year — the Jaguars lost 47-46 to Regis Jesuit in the Great 8 last season on a last-second and-one — the Grizzlies march on with the confidence that they can earn Ortiz a ring for his thumb next weekend.
“We keep wanting to continue the tradition of this program,” Wight said. “We always want more. Next weekend, we can get it.”
Head coach Joe Ortiz of ThunderRidge Grizzlies works against the Rock Canyon Jaguars during the first half of their Colorado state high school basketball tournament Great 8 game at the Denver Coliseum on Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024. (Photo by AAron Ontiveroz/The Denver Post)
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