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Show Vikings fall to Weber 42-36, finish in 7th Injuries to Jones and Burnham give Weber edge in consolation bracket championship match - , ,y yy I yyy.J r- i By G.BRETT HART Sports Editor OGDEN With a state fifth place finish (not to mention a little revenge) on the line, the Lady Viewmont Viking basketball team had a chance to do something they hadn't been able to do during the regular season defeat the Weber Warriors. Going into Saturday afternoon's consolation bracket championship at the Dee Events Center, the Lady Vikings had already fallen to Weber three times in as many meetings. Now Viewmont would have one final shot at the Warriors. Unfortunately for the Vikes, fate (and a relentless Warrior offensive scoring machine) handed the Vikes a 42-36 defeat and a seventh place finish in the state 4A girls' basketball basket-ball tournament. Actually, fate struck the night before as two critical injuries against another Region 1 nemesis, Bonneville, put Vikings Jen Jones and Nikki Burnham out of action for Saturday's game with knee and ankle injuries, respectively. Jones suffered a knee injury, the seriou sness of which is yet to be determined. de-termined. Burnham went down with torn ligaments in her ankle. The loss proved insurmountable in spite of Viewmont's impressive, never-say-die-performance that kept the Vikes in the game until the final buzzer and held the Warriors to a slim six-point victory. In Burnham 's absence, senior guard Bridgette Owens was left to wreak havoc upon the Viking defense, leading the Warriors with 16 points. Meanwhile, wi u."Ht Jones' imposing im-posing presence inside, Weber center Jodi McKay was able to amass 12 points and nine rebounds over her shorter Viewmont opponents. oppo-nents. Heather Le Mmon led Viking scoring with 11, followed by Shannon Morrow and Mandy Miller who chipped in 8 and 7, respectively. Although she couldn't match McKay's performance, Kim Mar-chant Mar-chant (who ferociously filled the center spot in Jones' absence) held her ground, scoring 10 points against Bonneville the night before and six against Weber. "Kim really came in and did a good job for us," Viewmont coach Ralph Ashby said. "It's hard to lose your top scorer and not miss her, but Kim played really well." In first quarter action, the Viking defense was back at work forcing two early Weber turnovers but failing fail-ing to convert them into buckets. As play progressed, Viewmont managed to force two additional Weber turnovers but still couldn't capitalize on the offensive side of the floor. Weber held a slim 4-2 margin with 2:25 remaining. But as the first-minute jitters wore off, so did both teams scoring slumps. The game became a seesaw battle with the first quarter ending 9-8 in Weber's favor. Viewmont, plagued by a stagnant offense, watched as Weber steadily built a 17-10 lead with 2:41 left in the half. Turnovers began to stifle the Vikings Vik-ings while the Warriors controlled the offensive boards. By the end of the second, Weber had outscored Viewmont 12-2 and entered the locker room with a comfortable 21-10 21-10 lead. As the third period progressed, the Vikings began to make a com- Viewmont s bhannon Morrow battles for position against Weber's Jodi McKay Saturday in a consolation bracket championship mat chup for fifth and seventh place. The Warriors edged the Vikings 42-36. (Clipper photo by G. Brett Hart) eback spearheaded by the aggressive ag-gressive play of Miller and Morrow. Down by as many as 10, 24-14, Viewmont managed to cut the Warrior War-rior stranglehold to 26-18 with two minutes remaining in the quarter. Miller sank a charity toss and field; suddenly, the Vikes were only down by six, 27-21. However, the Viewmont run was short-lived, as the Warriors regained regain-ed their 10-point lead by quarter's end, 31-21. With just over three minutes remaining, re-maining, Le Mmon brought the Vikes to within nine, 37-28 from the line. Moments later two March ant charity tosses would cut the Warrior lead to 7, 37-30. Another Weber foul brought Morrow to the line to sink two more. With 2:39 on the clock, the Vikings Vik-ings found themselves trailing by a meager five points, 37-32 after a 9-0 run. In spite of the valiant effort, this would be as close as the Vikes would come. Eventually, Le Mmon and Mar- chant would leave the game with five fouls, and the Warriors would ride to their best tournament performance per-formance in three years. "We had an excellent season. It's always pice to go undefeated and win the championship, but we played hard. I'm prcud of the way our girls played. "Except for that spurt in the second se-cond quarter when we didn't score and they got a utile ahead of us, I thought we played Weber pretty evenly. "Sure we lost some games dur ing the season, but the one thing I'm most proud of is the number of close games we won. If the girls hadn't gone out and given the extra effort, this could have been a disastrous season. "They wanted it bad enough to go out and earn it," Ashby added. MOUNTAIN VIEW 57, BRIGHTON 53 OGDEN After defeating tournament favorite, the seemingly SEE VIKINGS ONA-11 Vikings CONTINUED FROM A-10 unstoppable Bingham Miners, Mountain View had just one obstacle between it and a 4A state championship Region 2 champion Brighton. Fortunately for the Bruins, the euphoria of ending Bingham's 35-game 35-game winning streak wore off in time to come back from a 14-6, first period deficit against Brighton. Mountain View turned on the big guns and cut the Bengal's eight-point eight-point lead to five by the end of the first eight minutes of play. Brighton held a shaky 21-16 lead going into the second quarter. Second period action, however, was mostly Mountain View. The Bruins battled to a 32-30 lead by halftime outscoring the Bengals 14- 11. Third period play pitted the well-oiled well-oiled Bengal offensive machine against the brute strength of Mountain Moun-tain View's rebounding, which eventually proved to be the determining deter-mining factor in the game. Mountain Moun-tain View outrebounded the smaller Brighton team 48-19 over the course of the game. The resulting seesaw battle eventually even-tually turned to the Bruins' favor for good as Mountain View's Kim Henry tossed in a bucket from the paint to give her team a 49-47 lead in the fourth. - The Bruins hit eight straight from the free throw line. Brighton managed to pull within 2, 55-53, but Julie Wilde's ensuing two shots from the charity stripe in the waning wan-ing seconds iced the 4-point win and handed Mountain View the 4A title. Bingham went on to beat Orem convincingly, 65-55, to claim third place. The Tigers, of course, ended in fourth. Hillcrest followed in sixth place with a slim 42-39 win over West Jordan High School Saturday in a battle for sixth and eighth. |