Keenan girls’ comeback comes up short in Class 3A title game to Bishop England
Bishop England coach Paul Runey drew up what turned out to be the perfect game plan for Keenan’s pressure defense and dynamic duo in Milaysia Fulwiley and Dyani Burke.
The Bishops turned that into a 54-46 victory over the Raiders Saturday afternoon in the Class 3A girls’ title game at the Colonial Life Arena to give them their sixth state championship since 2012.
“A lot of their offense comes from their defense,” Runey said. “In all the tapes I watched, they were getting steals out front and then taking the ball in for layups. Part of game plan was to not give them those opportunities.”
The Bishops were making their seventh championship game appearance in the last eight years. It’s the third time they met the Raiders in the finals with Bishop England winning in 2016 and Keenan winning in 2013. But this one stands at the top for now.
“Well, it ranks as the best because it’s the current one right now. We love it, we really do,” Runey said.
Keenan never really pressed until the fourth quarter. A lot of that had to with the fact they shot 31.4 percent from field and couldn’t set it up.
It was close throughout and neither team led by more than four points until Bishop England (28-1) used a 17-0 run to close the third quarter and start the fourth. Keenan (17-8) held its last lead at 28-26 when Josie Dennis started the deciding run that gave the Bishops a 43-28 lead with 7:15 remaining.
The Raiders did pull within seven points on back-to-back three-pointers by Dyani Burke, but the Bishops responded with another 10-2 spurt to put it out of reach. The run was highlighted when Katie Brooks, who had a game-high 20 points, made four free throws with 4:29 remaining after Keenan was whistled for a foul and a technical for slamming the ball on the floor.
Keenan trimmed the lead to seven again with 49 seconds left but they couldn’t ever get any closer.
“Once we got to seven, we thought we could get little more turnovers and get momentum going,” Keenan coach Reggie McLain said. “But we made a foul, made a mistake and had a turnover. Then we had to put them on the free throw line, and we knew they were a good shooting free throw shooting team.”
Bishop England finished 20-of-26 from the free throw line.
Fulwiley, the sensational 8th grader that had South Carolina coach Dawn Staley sitting on press row to watch, finished with 18 points and Burke, who went over 1,000 points for her career during the game, finished with 17. But they combined to go 11-of-33 from the field with 10 combined turnovers.
Fulwiley and Burke will be back next year along with everyone else. The Raiders don’t have a senior on the roster.
“We knew this year was a year we could knock on the door and let everyone know we were a good team,” McLain said. “With no seniors this year, we thought next year would be a year we could make a good push and make a run at a state championship.”
This story was originally published March 2, 2019 at 4:27 PM.