Woronoff: Nease's super seniors go out gracefully
Mar 2, 2019 at 8:52 PM Mar 2, 2019 at 8:56 PM
The seconds were ticking down and Fort Lauderdale Dillard was holding onto the ball with a two-point lead.
There was still over a minute left, but with no tomorrow, Nease couldn't take any chances.
This was the game that the Nease Panthers had waited for all year. This was the game that four-year varsity players Kiya Turner and Peyton Carter had waited their entire high school careers for. This was the game that Nease head coach Sherri Anthony and assistant Bernie Blue had been waiting two decades for.
Nease, trailing by 11 late in the third quarter, was in striking distance in Saturday's Class 7A girls basketball championship with a chance to win their first title in 20 years. But the Panthers needed to get the ball back. And to do that somebody had to foul.
That somebody turned out to be star player Camille Hobby. The 6-foot-3 North Carolina State recruit, was playing at the top of the zone, saddled with four fouls. Ideally, Hobby would be the player to take a final shot, but she knew she had to sacrifice herself to give her teammates a chance.
"I was just trying to put them in better position," she said.
Hobby fouled out with 1:13 left, finishing her final high school game with nine points and nine rebounds.
She knew what had to be done and never hesitated. It was the type of play Anthony has seen all year from her five seniors.
"You'll never see a more mature group than this," she said. "These seniors are great leaders, in the classroom, on the basketball court, in the community. They're going to do big things. I guarantee you'll be hearing these names again, whether it's in basketball, business or politics."
Tears flowed as Anthony hugged each player and draped their runner-up medals around their necks.
"Our hearts are broken," Anthony said. "You want to win, you never want to take second."
The 43-40 loss to the Dillard Panthers was just the second loss of the season for Nease. Its only other loss came to Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas (64-62), which advanced to Saturday's Class 8A title game.
"Of course you want to win," said Hobby, sitting alongside fellow seniors Turner and Tia Robinson in the JP Funding Center interview room. "Sadly our high school careers our over. We didn't get to win the state championship, but you can't question things like that."
Hobby will move on to N.C. State, Turner to Middle Tennessee State, Carter to Davidson. Robinson is still weighing her options. None of the four senior starters will forget all the things they accomplished this season — winning conference, district and region titles, advancing to the state final four and the championship game for just the second time in school history.
"I think we had a great time playing for each other," said Robinson, who joined the team as a senior after transferring from Fleming Island. "What we've been fighting for all year just didn't come our way."
With the strength of four 3-pointers in the third quarter, Dillard took a double-digit lead — the first by either team — with 41 seconds left in the period. But Robinson, who finished with a team-high 10 points, answered with three straight baskets.
With 1:03 left, Carter converted an offensive rebound to pull Nease to within a point at 41-40. Dillard's Genovea Johnson made a pair of free throws with 59 seconds to go. With 5 seconds remaining, Nease set up a play it calls "Army," with Carter setting a screen for Turner to shoot a potential tying 3-pointer from the top of the circle. The shot bounced off the rim.
"She'll take that shot 100 times in practice and make 80," Anthony said.
Anthony says she will return for a 34th season to develop a new cast with starter Stephanie Manherz returning for her senior year. Compared to Dillard's Marcia Pinder, Anthony is a neophyte. Pinder finished her 42nd season and won her 10th state championship. Her teams have never lost a state title game.
This time their opponents gave them all they could handle.
"This was a great season," Robinson said. "Unfortunately it had to come to an end."
Brent Woronoff is The Record's Sports Editor. You can reach him at bworonoff@staugustine.come