Clearwater ends Bloomfield's season

Jerry Jarrell photo Bloomfield senior Garrett Rice pushes the ball upcourt after a steal during the Wildcats' 61-47 loss to Clearwater in a Class 3, District 2 semifinal game Tuesday at Broseley.

BROSELEY -- When the Bloomfield Wildcats lost their leading scorer to an injury late in the season, many wrote the defending Class 3, District 2 champs off.

Instead of feeling sorry for themselves, talking about could have been and making excuses, the Wildcats rallied around the adversity and put together 11 straight wins down the stretch without their top player

But the improbable run came to an end Tuesday night in the semifinals of the Class 3, District 2 Tournament at Twin Rivers High School. Clearwater took advantage of Bloomfield's lack of offense, played solid on both ends of the court and hit its free throws in the closing minutes to end the Wildcats' season, 61-47, and advance to the championship game

Clearwater (21-3) will play the states' No. 1 ranked team in Class 3, Arcadia Valley, for the district title Thursday night after the undefeated Tigers clipped host Twin Rivers, 78-68, in the evening's first semifinal game.

Without Leighton Hensley in the lineup, Bloomfield has struggled to find offense ever since the senior went down with a season-ending leg injury, but the Wildcats have managed to grind out wins with hustle and defense. Against a quality opponent like Clearwater (21-3) the weakness was exposed.

The Wildcats found themselves down 7-0 to open the game, and 13-5 midway through the first period. Bloomfield chipped away at the deficit in the second and made it a 28-26 game at the half, but against Clearwater's tight zone defense and the lack of a go-to-guy on the offensive end of the floor, the Tigers shut out the Wildcats in the third quarter to take control of the game, 39-26, heading in the final eight minutes of play.

"We got really poor spacing and we were trying to force things and just couldn't finish at the rim," A disappointed Bloomfield coach Dustin Hicks said after the game. "We were 6-for-21 tonight from point blank. It's one of those things... just couldn't put it in the hole tonight.

"They were really contesting and being physical and they took us off our game a little bit," Hicks continued. "Credit Clearwater. They played really sound defense. They weren't challenging the passing lanes but there really wasn't much room to drive and they were really closing in on the shooters. Clearwater played exceptional defense in the third quarter and I want to wish them luck moving on to the finals against Arcadia Valley."

Even with the dismal third quarter, Bloomfield wasn't giving up on the season just yet.

"The halves were mirror images of each other," Hicks noted. "(We) Got behind, weren't doing a lot of things right you dig back and that's the character on this team. They've done that for three years for me. They could have laid down, especially going into the fourth. Then they go ahead and in a minute and a half they've got it down to six, even cutting it to four at one time, and then caught up in the emotion of it we make a silly foul and know you've got it down to four with two and a half minutes left? We gave ourselves an opportunity even as bad as we played in spurts. But Clearwater was just more consistent for four quarters."

With seemingly everything going against the Wildcats, Bloomfield made it a 4-point game (49-45) on back-to-back 3-pointers by juniors Dylan Bader and Seth Hill, the last coming with 2:32 remaining on the game clock.

But Clearwater had the answer to Bloomfield's comeback attempt as the Tigers put the ball in the hands of senior Luke Hillis. Bloomfield had gone to he press at the start of the fourth to try and generate some offense off turnovers, but down the stretch Hillis controlled the ball and the game. Clearwater hit 14 consecutive free throws to close out the game, 10 by Hillis who finished with a game-high 23 points, to end the Wildcats' season. Clearwater was 22-of-29 from the foul line for the game.

"This team was 10-6 when Leighton went down," Hicks commented. "They really have a lot to be proud of. I told them you are one of the few groups to graduate from here and have absolutely no regrets. You won a district, played for a conference title, you won 21 games without your all-region possibly all-state candidate this year in Leighton. You're thinking we're 6-of-21 around the bucket and Leighton kind of puts those in sometimes. We've been able to dodge some bullets without him, but that has kind of been our Achilles heel without him for the last four or five games, finishing at the rim. It finally caught up with us tonight."

Bloomfield's Garrett Rice finished with 14 points, while Hill chipped in with 11 as the Wildcats finished the season, 21-7.