After easily dispatching Peninsula Catholic on Tuesday in the quarterfinals, Blue Ridge faced a tough Steward team in the semifinals of the VISAA Invitational State Tournament on Thursday night. For one quarter, Steward gave the Barons all they could handle.
For one quarter.
After briefly falling behind early in the game, Blue Ridge responded with a 16-0 run in the second quarter, followed by a 17-0 run in the third quarter, and the Barons went on to a comfortable 75-42 victory to earn themselves a trip to the state championship on Saturday.
Derrick Jones had an outstanding performance, recording 23 points and eight rebounds, including 16 points in the first half.
“It’s really a team effort, not just me making shots cause anybody on this team can make shots at any given time,” Jones said. “But I feel like my team did a great job of setting me up. Great baseline passes, seeing me on my backdoor cuts.”
Jones scored seven points in the first quarter, but the Barons got off to a slow start as a team, turning the ball over and not getting quality shots early on. Blue Ridge held a slim 13-11 lead after the first quarter.
Zach Rosenthal was a major factor in Steward’s success early on, hitting a few threes, including one at the beginning of the second quarter to give Steward a 14-13 advantage.
“After the first quarter, Coach told us we needed to lock in on defense and execute our plays better,” said Kobe Jerome, who finished with 18 points and 5 assists. “We just came out with confidence and started knocking down our shots.”
Jones scored the next eight points of the game, which turned into a 16-0 run to give the Barons a commanding 29-14 lead. Steward’s Curtis Blair ended the run with four straight points to end the half, but the damage was done. Blue Ridge led 29-18 at halftime.
Steward switched to a zone defense to start the second half which briefly slowed Blue Ridge down and forced the fast-paced Barons to be more patient on offense.
Another Rosenthal three-pointer got Steward within eight points early in the third quarter, but Blue Ridge responded with another strong run, this time scoring 17 consecutive points. The Barons swarmed the Steward ball-handlers with a full-court press which led to easy transition points. Blue Ridge also dominated on the offensive glass and got several baskets off of second chance opportunities. At the end of the third quarter, Blue Ridge led 49-26.
Despite winning by such a large margin, the Blue Ridge players still feel they have much to improve on ahead of Saturday’s championship game.
“Even tonight we didn’t feel we played to the best of our abilities,” Jones said.
Kobe Jerome hit a flurry of threes in the fourth quarter to ensure that there would be no comeback from Steward and Blue Ridge went on to win 75-42.
Blue Ridge is set to face Norfolk Collegiate on Saturday at 5 p.m. in a rematch of last season’s state title game.
