BOULDER — Basketball isn’t referred to as a game of runs by coincidence.
It was especially evident Wednesday at the Coors Events Center, where Silver Creek exchanged shifts, surges and segments with Pueblo East in earning a 57-45 victory in a Class 4A girls semifinal.
The Raptors improved to 25-2 and will head to their first championship game in school history Friday night.
They can point to outrunning the Eagles, who finished 25-2 and were bidding to play for their school’s second Colorado championship and first since 1978.
“It certainly was,” Silver Creek coach Dan Kloster said. “Our (runs) came up bigger, I guess. It was definitely that, it was a game of runs.”
None was bigger than Silver Creek’s 17-2 surge to begin the second half. The Raptors trailed 27-19 at halftime, then took over the game in outscoring the Eagles 38-18.
Better ball movement and free-throw shooting — Silver Creek was 6-of-13 at the break — plus a press that created turnovers and transition fueled a 13-0 run. And it happened quickly — by the time Pueblo East scored its first basket of the third quarter, with 5:20 to play, it was trailing 32-29.
“That made a huge difference in the dynamics of the game,” Kloster said.
The Raptors’ Meghan Heimstra wasn’t particularly sharp, but she tied for team-high scoring honors (16 points) with Lauren Wolfinger. Heimstra helped fuel the decisive run and Wolfinger and Janelle Kramer (9-of-10 for the game) made late free throws to seal it. Silver Creek made 18-of-23 after halftime and it was the difference — oddly enough, both teams shot 16-of-46 from the floor.
“I think we just got our jitters out, the lighting’s different and we got used to the court,” Heimstra said. “We just shot better and rebounded.”
Pueblo East didn’t totally fade after halftime. The Eagles gathered themselves and got within six points with less than four minutes to play, but didn’t sustain their earlier effort, when they were successful inside and weren’t bothered by the Raptors’ pressure.
However, Maleah Gregory, who led the team with 20 points and 10 rebounds, picked up her fourth foul early in the third and wasn’t the same.
“It’s hard to swallow,” said Pueblo East coach Ben Garcia, who continues to valiantly battle a form of lymphoma. “Especially coming in the second half when we were ahead . . . Their press hadn’t been bothering us, but (the Raptors) did a great job, they really did. We have to handle that, we have to take care of business at the time.”
