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Girls Basketball News

Ideally, a team peaks at the end of the season and plays its best game in its last game, which hopefully comes in the post-season. The Stratford Spartans Girls Basketball team played inspired Friday night at the Merrell Center in Katy in its second-round playoff game against a Tompkins team that had 31 wins and only three losses.

The Spartans opened the game with big three-point shots from senior Audrey Hernandez and freshman Rachel Ashby, and took a 14-8 lead after Hernandez found senior Jasmine Green under the basket againat the shell-shocked Falcons.
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Head Coach Alexis Greene used a tight rotation throughout the game and it clicked, but early in the game she went to the bench for senior Nilou Mahmoodpour, who was injured last year and has not played significant minutes this season in her rehabilitation. Mahmoodpour promptly drained a trey from the corner, igniting her coaches, teammates, and everyone in the Merrell Center who was wearing green. 

The Spartans defense played as good of a game as they have all season, holding Tompkins to near its season low in points scored in regulation. Nevertheless, the Falcons climbed back to keep it close in the first half, especially after Jazz went to the bench with two early fouls. 

With two minutes remaining in the 3rd quarter, the Falcons held a one-point lead. In the span of three minutes, Tompkins held a nine-point lead early in the 4th. The Spartans turned up the defensive pressure, the Falcons failed to make their shots, and Stratford clawed back. With approximately two minutes remaining, Hernandez hit a three from the right corner to tie at 45 apiece.
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Down 2 points with the clock ticking and Tompkins defense cutting off the Spartans three-point shooters, Jazz received the ball on the right wing, drove to the basket where the defense met her, executed a spin move from just outside the lane and lofted in a six-footer to tie the score (47-47) with 6.9 seconds on the clock.
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Tompkins got free in the open court and drove to the basket with time to score, only to arrive face-to-face with sophomore Holly Horton, who blocked the shot with impunity. Ashby attempted to control the loose ball only to be tackled and nearly injured by a Tompkins player at the buzzer. The refs swallowed their whistles. Had they called the obvious foul, it would have put the excellent free-throw shooting Ashby on the line with no time on the clock and a tie game.

In overtime, Tompkins shots started falling and the Stratford-six of Hernandez, Jazz, AshbyHorton, juniors Maggie Parker and JaKyla Cheeves, who played the vast majority of the minutes in the game, had tired legs that always make shots more difficult. The Spartans fell 57-51 in OT.

Cheeves played one of her best games of the season. She led the team with 14 points on four of five shooting from the field and five of seven from the charity stripe. She was often a spark in keeping the Spartans in the game on both offense and defense.

Hernandez followed with 11 points, including three big three-pointers and five rebounds.

Jazz scored nine points and garnered nine rebounds despite limited minutes in the first half and fouling out late in the game.

Parker scored seven points and had four rebounds. Ashby, despite only adding two free-throws to her first quarter three, was arguably the Spartans MVP on the night by superlatively protecting the ball, running the team like an experienced general, and creating at least three turnovers and three assists.  
 

Head Coach Alexis Green was voted District 17-6A Coach of the Year, three years into her tenure, after getting the Spartans into the post-season for the first time in seven years. 

Stratford vs. Bellaire

On Wednesday, February 16th the Spartans played their first post-season game in seven years. There didn't appear to be any rust on this year's team as they thoroughly dominated Bellaire 52-33 at Delmar Stadium. The Spartans outrebounded the Cardinals 51-34 and shot 19% from behind the arc to only 6% for Bellaire. 

In their first post-season wins of their careers in a Stratford uniform, Ashby and Jazz led with 13 points each. Jazz also snagged 16 rebounds in only 20 minutes of action! Hernandez scored 10 and Cheeves had 9. Parker had 13 rebounds to go with 4 points.

The bench made sure the game was in hand by "brewing" on the sidelines with Horton holding an imaginary pot and junior Lily McClanahan stirring it while the rest of the bench added "ingredients" while their teammates were shooting free throws. It must have worked, with Ashby and Green both going five for eight and Hernandez shooting five for six.

1st Team All-District:
Audrey Hernandez
Jasmine Green
Rachel Ashby

2nd Team All-District:
JaKyla Cheeves

Honorable Mention All-District:
Maggie Parker

District 17-6A Coach of the Year:
Alexis Green

The Lady Spartans concluded the regular season this past Wednesday with all three teams respectively throttling Northbrook. The Freshman team went undefeated in district play and the JV team finished in 3rd place.

Varsity finished in a tie for 3rd and will advance to the playoffs for the first time in seven seasons. They will play Bellaire on Tuesday, February 15th at Delmar at 7 pm. Here is the link to purchase tickets:

Bellaire vs. Stratford: https://gofan.co/app/events/535920

This is excerpted from the "Houston Chronicle's" Elliot Lapin:

Stratford led Northbrook 6-0 after one quarter behind three points apiece from senior Jasmine Green and freshman Rachel Ashby before putting up 23 points in the second quarter to take a 29-2 halftime lead.

Seven different Lady Spartans scored in the second quarter led by six points from junior Jakyla Cheeves and five points apiece from Ashby and senior Audrey Hernandez.

“It was awesome to get everybody in the game, everybody in the rotation,” said (Head Coach Alexis) Green. “All the girls had fun. All the girls support each other. They cheer for each other. They love each other, and it’s just an awesome feeling to have.”

All of senior Bianca Pinal’s co-game-high ten points came in the second half. Cheeves also finished with ten points.

Stratford’s six seniors were recognized and honored in a senior night ceremony before the game.

Stratford’s playoff berth is its first in seven seasons.

“It means a lot,” said Green, “It means a lot to the community. It means a lot to the kids. It means a lot to me; it will be my first time going to the playoffs as a head coach.”

“I’m elated, and I’m glad for them because they deserve it. They’ve worked so hard,” Green added.