The Fernley High School girls basketball team is looking to claim the top seed from the East Division for next week's Northern 3A Region Tournament.
With a win over Dayton Friday night, the Fernley High School girls basketball team would clinch the No. 1 seed from the Northern 3A East Division. The Vaqueros enter the game at 8-1 in league play, holding a half-game lead over Fallon for the league's top spot. Fallon closes the season with two games this weekend, Friday at Spring Creel and Saturday at Elko.
If both teams finish 9-1 in league play, the Vaqueros would take the top spot by virtue of the NIAA tiebreakers. A Fernley win over Dayton and a Fallon loss in one of its two games would give Fernley the outright league championship.
Under the NIAA tiebreaking procedures, the teams receive one point for each game won in league play by their defeated opponents. If both teams finish 9-1, their only losses would be against each other, so they would have defeated the same opponents. The next tiebreaker goes to the team which allowed the fewer points in their league matchups. Fallon won the first game between the two teams 45-42, but Fernley won the second 68-56, so the cumulative scores of those games favors Fernley, 110-101.
If Fernley were to lose to Dayton, the tiebreaker would depend on the outcome of this weekend's games to determine how many points each team would get for their defeated opponents.
No matter whether they're the No. 1 or No. 2 seed, the Vaqueros will play a home game Monday at 6 p.m. to open the tournament. The regional semifinals are next Friday, Feb. 13 at Wooster, with the championship game Feb. 14.
The Vaqueros gave themselves a chance to the No. 1 seed by sweeping Elko and Spring Creek last week, beating the Indians 48-31 Friday night and Spring Creek 55-30 Saturday.
Coach Ralph Dunn came into Friday's game leery of the Indians, who led the Vaqueros for most of the second half in the first meeting between the teams, before Fernley escaped with a 51-49 win.
Five minutes into the game, it seemed Dunn's fears might be well founded. After the Vaqueros scored just two points in the game's first five minutes, they started getting the ball inside to Taylor Tollestrup, who scored 21 of her 27 points in the second and third quarters, when the Vaqueros outscored Elko 29-16.
A basket by Tollestrup put Fernley up 13-12 with 3:56 left in the second quarter, and the Vaqueros never trailed again.
"A slow start against Elko, but finally kicked in after half, Dunn said.
Leading 23-17 at the half, the Vaqueros scored the first seven and the last four points of the third quarter, to take a 36-24 advantage to the fourth, where they allowed Elko just seven points.
That defensive effort carried over to Saturday, where the Vaqueros held Spring Creek to three points in the first quarter, establishing a 15-3 lead. Leading 29-15 early in the third quarter, the Vaqueros used a 10-0 run to blow the game open.
"I thought the girls played awesome defense in both games," Dunn said. "We're still working on transitions and some offensive sets and we need to brush up on them for regionals coming up."
Lillianna Young scored seven points and Laura Rosales added six against Elko. Against Spring Creek, Tollestrup scored 23 and Sophie Mossner added eight and Justice Martell-Artiaga had seven.
"Some girls are starting to step up and know their roles," Dunn said. "A good bench performance I thought in these two games."
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