Girls basketball: Sofia Tavarez gets 1,000th career point, Panas advances in state regionals
YORKTOWN − Some people shrink on the big stage. Others shine under the brightest lights.
Last year, during the Panas girls basketball team’s unexpected run to a state championship, Cadence Nicholas recorded her 1,000th point in the state semifinals.
Tuesday night, it was best friend Sofia Tavarez, Nicholas’s teammate since they played St. Columbanus CYO ball together as third-graders, who hit her milestone shot on a big stage.
And it was only appropriate that the speedy junior guard did so on a fast break. Tavarez’s bucket − the first points of the second quarter for Panas − followed her seven first-quarter points and another 12 she’d later hit as she amassed 21 points during Panas’s 63-30 rout of Section 9 Red Hook in the state Class A regional semifinals at Yorktown High School.
“It’s amazing. We’d both talked about it (hitting 1,000) when we were little. It’s a dream come true,” Tavarez said.
Before that second quarter ended, a 14-12 Panas lead had grown to 32-19
And things never improved for the Red Raiders, who couldn’t handle their opponent's speed and unrelenting defensive pressure.
Three Panthers accounted for 18 steals and Panas had well over 20 overall.
What it means
Red Hook, which earlier won its third straight Section 9 title with an upset of top-seeded Marlboro, finished the season 16-7.
Panas, now 22-3, will travel to Binghamton Sunday to face Section 4 champion Johnson City in a state Class A regional final. That game is slated for 3:30 p.m. at Visions Veterans Memorial Arena.
The winner will advance to the March 15 state Class A semifinals at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy.
Highlights
Tuesday’s game looked like it would be very much a game after the Raiders’ 6-1 junior center Emilie Kent went inside for a score, Nina Kortbus blocked a shot and Chloe Hayes nailed a 3-pointer for Red Hook.
But in a sign of what would be things to come over and come again, Jillian Cinquina of Panas stole the ball and Nicholas scored off a Tavarez feed.
Nicholas then scored off a spinning jumper and Tavarez got an offensive rebound off her own miss, scored, was fouled and hit the foul shot to put Panas up 7-5 with 3:31 left in the first quarter.
Red Hook had its good moments in the period with Kent scoring off a nice Katie Boyd inside feed and Boyd later hitting a 3 to make the score 12-12.
But the quarter ended with Tavarez driving inside to put Panas up 14-12.
Red Hook never challenged again with Panas building a 10-point, 24-14 lead less than two minutes into the second quarter.
When Tavarez made one of her team-high eight steals late in the period and scored, the Panthers had a comfortable 32-18 lead.
Any chance for a comeback quickly dimmed in the third quarter when Panas, up 32-19 halftime, scored 13 unanswered points to open the quarter.
When Nicholas simultaneously blocked and stole the ball, then was fouled as she scored and sank her free throw, the quarter ended with Panas on top 58-23.
Stat line
Nicholas, whose game-high 23 points came off everything from spins and reverse lay-ins to a 3, also had four steals.
In addition to her 21 points, Tavarez had seven assists, five rebounds and eight steals.
Cinquina had eight points, five assists and six steals (one an acrobatic grab along the sidelines) and Katie Hofmann had two of Panas’s seven 3s for six points.
For Red Hook, which totalled only 11 points in the second half, Kent finished with a team-high 11 points and Boyd had nine points.
Quotables
Red Hook senior Liv Christensen, a five-year varsity player, said Panas’s defensive pressure made her team go “up-tempo.”
“We were kind of getting out of our groove,” she said.
While unhappy to see her season end, Christensen said, “We had an amazing year and just to be here was an amazing time.”
“We use our speed and athleticism to tire teams out,” Nicholas said.
Girls basketball: The Journal News/lohud Section 1 playoff scoreboard keeps you up to date
The junior said Panas’s defense had been responsible for almost every victory during her four years on varsity
Defense, she said, “gives us momentum.”
Tavarez, who was mobbed by fans after the game, many seeking photos with her, said Panas, which was the Section 1’s No. 2 seed this year in Class A despite being the defending state champion, said her squad will work to return to the championship game by “just keeping things going, playing the game confident.”
Nancy Haggerty covers cross-country, track & field, field hockey, skiing, ice hockey, basketball, girls lacrosse and other sporting events for The Journal News/lohud. Follow her on Twitter at @HaggertyNancy
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Girls basketball: Tavarez nets 1,000th point, Panas routs Red Hook
