2020 Minnesota Girl's State Tournament - Class AAAA Semifinal Game - Farmington vs STMA 3-12-20

The nightcap at Williams Arena on this Thursday night was the highly-anticipated Class AAAA semifinal game between Farmington and STMA.  Of all the games at this state tournament, this one by far and away was the one I was looking forward to the most. 

STMA would draw first blood in this contest at the 17:25 mark when junior guard Kendal Cox connected with a lay-up that drew a foul in the process and her ensuing "and one" gave the Knights a 3-0 lead.  Farmington would come right back, however, and assume a 4-3 lead on a short jumper by junior guard Peyton Blandin at the 16:03 mark and another short Blandin jumper at the 15:31 mark increased that lead to 6-3.  Junior post Sophie Hart's short jumper in the lane at the 13:52 mark gave the Tigers a 10-6 lead and a lay-up by senior guard Katelyn Mohr at the 12:43 mark that drew a foul with the resulting "and one" now had Farmington up 15-8.  STMA would claw their way back into this game, however, and a "3" by sophomore guard Emma Miller at the 9:05 mark had the Knights back to within a single possession down 17-15.  At the 9:19 mark, STMA's senior forward Vanessa Alexander would score in the paint to get this one tied at 17.  Farmington would take its cue and establish a 21-17 lead with 6:25 left and two free throws by junior guard Paige Kindseth with 5:15 left increased that lead to 23-17.  Blandin's short jumper a bit later increased the lead to eight at 25-17 and sophomore guard Rose Willie's pretty reverse lay-up with 4:05 left now gave the Tigers a ten-point cushion at 27-17 and STMA now had its work cut out for them.  With 2:32 left, Blandin would connect with a lay-up in transition for 31-19 Farmington lead and an offensive rebound and putback by Hart made it 33-22.  STMA senior guard Mackenzie Kramer finally got untracked with her three-point bomb with 1:11 left but for the Knights, it was a long time coming and although STMA was able to get back into single-digit range down 36-27 by the halftime break, they were going to need more of the Kramer artillery to narrow the gap.  One of the reasons for Farmington's first half success was that they held a 21-13 edge on the boards and their defense limited STMA to 9-25 from FG range for 36% and 4-12 from downtown for 33.3%.

STMA got a big lift when freshman forward Tessa Johnson drained a "3" at the 17:02 mark to reduce the deficit to eight at 38-30 and another "3" by senior guard Lily Tennyson at the 16:10 mark reduced that deficit to five at 38-33.  With 15:26 left, Johnson would drain another "3" to bring the Knights back to within a single possession down 38-36 and this bombs away attack caused Farmington Head Coach Liz Carpentier to call a timeout to try and make some quick defensive adjustments.  Johnson would strike again at the 14:18 mark to keep STMA in that two-point range down 40-38.  Farmington recovered somewhat and two Hart free throws at the 11:59 mark gave the Tigers more breathing room up 44-38.  Right back came STMA though and a "3" by Miller at the 10:33 mark suddenly had this one tied at 44.  Farmington would again push the "go" button and get a 48-45 lead at the 9:25 mark and with 8:50 left, the Tigers grew that lead to 52-45.  With just over 6:00 left, Farmington's Blandin drained a back-breaking "3" to give the Tigers a 57-48 advantage but less than a minute later with 5:22 left, STMA had that deficit whittled down to five points at 57-52.  But with 4:45 left, the Tigers again increased their lead to nine at 61-52 and with 4:20 left, they had a double-digit advantage at 63-52 and now the Knights were clearly under the gun.  With 4:00 left, Blandin's lay-up in ttransition maintained the eleven-point edge at 65-54.  With 2:35 left and a 67-54 lead, Farmington now started playing keep-away on the offensive end and started applying the finishing touches from the charity stripe and Farmington would advance to Saturday night's championship game with a 78-59 victory. 

STMA Head Coach Kent Hamre was in the press conference afterward with both Kramer and Johnson.  Hamre on the flow of this game:  "It just seemed like we were just constantly battling to try and get uphill and they'd make a run....And when you're constantly fighting back, it's tough to keep that momentum going....And as good of a team as they are, you just can't give them that many runs....We worked for every point we got and they were getting a lot of putbacks and we knew going into the game that we'd have to keep them off of the offensive boards and that Hart's (Sophie of Farmington) is a heckuva player....She does such a nice job on the offensive boards....We tried many different things and we threw everything but the kitchen sink at her today....."  I asked Hamre if Farmington's size - particularly Hart - bothered his team more than they might have originally anticipated.  "It did" he replied.  He pointed out that he felt that if squad could get into more transition opportunites it would neutralize some of their half-court strength.  But he knew his team would have to make the most of their outside game and the Knights outside game on this night just wasn't enough to overcome the strength that Farmington has with their inside game.  Hamre also felt that Kramer needed to get more touches on this night and that just didn't happen.  In listening to Kramer talk about this game and her career at STMA, it's beyond obvious how incredibly smart this young woman is and how incredibly wise she is beyond her years and she will be a smashing success at the next level.  Hamre also talked about how much his five seniors and the rest of this team means to him and that they did everything asked of them to get to this point and he lamented about not having a third-place game this year "but, it's something out of our control" he said.  Farmington's Carpentier was joined in the Farmington portion of the postgame press conference by both Hart and senior guard Molly Mogensen who's been out of action with a foot injury.  Carpentier on the game itself:  "Thank you....Well, first off, congratulations to STMA....They're a phenomenal basketball team with a lot of weapons and it's a tough match-up......I think that overall, we dominated the paint which was one of our goals; I thought both defensively, we turned it up in the second half and offensively, I thought that most of our shots came on the attack of the offensive rebound."  I asked Carpentier about how her team's defense on this night made STMA a little more one-dimensional than they wanted to be at the most crucial stretches of this contest.  "Yes, we talked about at halftime about just staying out on their players....And constantly in timeouts in the second half; we said we're not coming off to help; we had Sophie (Hart) in the paint and that she could own that and that we really wanted to take away the three."  Carpentier also heaped a lot of praise on Hart and her court awareness during this game.  "Sophie's a smart basketball player....She moved as you saw when we drove to the basket, she moved to the middle of the paint; she knew where the openings were coming from."  And even when STMA switched up defenses on them, she was still able to get the ball into the middle for scores.  I asked Carpentier as well about what's different with this team - now anyway - as they prepare to get ready for Hopkins on Saturday night than it was when they played the Royals earlier in the season and lost.  "I think we're more composed for certain situations....That playing that game back in December on our home court, we had kids that weren't ready for the 'big' game....And now they are and you can tell that in our last three games that we won some pretty big games; close games....We had different kids step up in every different situation so I think that playing that game back in December has only helped us.....We have grown....We have matured....We've stepped up in big-time roles and we filled those so we're going to come out and we're going to be more composed and relaxed."  Mogensen talked about - albeit with tears - about how she's had to play the role of supporting teammate on the bench while injured and it was easy to see the pain that she felt of being injured and not being able to be in on the action.  But she's been there supporting her teammates in every way she can.  "I miss the energy" she said with tears. 

When you glance at the final box score for this one, the one item that jumps out at you right away was Farmington's domination on the boards on this night by a stunning 41-25 count and, by far and away, it was Hart inflicting most of that damage.  Her individual stats are simply stunning - a "double-double" of 21 points and 16 rebounds - wow indeed!  And she's just a junior.  To their credit, STMA suffered "only" nine turnovers on this night but that rebounding gap and their inability to come up with more three-point bombs on this night really hurt them.  Besides Hart's heroics, it would be unfair not to mention Blandin whose 22 points on this night actually paced the Tigers and three players - Paige Kindseth, Mohr and Willie - all finished with 10 points on this night.  On the STMA side, Johnson poured in 27 points to lead all scorers and Kramer finished with 12 points.