End of the road

PUEBLO — Too many turnovers. Too many missed free throws. Too many missed opportunities.

The reasons behind No. 2-seeded Montrose’s 47-35 loss to No. 3 Mullen in the Sweet 16 of the Class 4A girls state basketball tournament on Friday were fairly obvious. Though they had several chances to cut their near game-long deficit and even take the lead, the Lady Indians could never quite get over the hump.

Eventually, time ran out on both the game and their season, as the Lady Indians ended their 2007-08 campaign 19-5, just three wins shy of tying the program record for victories in a season.

“We came up short, but I’m proud of the way the kids played today,” MHS head coach John Mraule said. “If we could’ve taken better care of the ball and hit some free throws I think this game would have been different. But they left it all out on the floor, and as a coach, that’s all I can ask of them.”

Montrose opened up the game well, taking an early 9-3 lead to start the first quarter. A series of turnovers and missed free throws by MHS quickly erased that lead, and the Lady Mustangs eventually took a 13-12 advantage at the end of the quarter.

The second quarter was more of the same, as Montrose managed just three points to Mullen’s 11 and quickly fell behind 24-15 going into halftime.

“Definitely, turnovers and free throws were the big things that hurt us,” senior forward Jordan DeJulio said. “We had opportunities to score, but we couldn’t convert. We tried and tried, but nothing would go in for us.”

Despite their rough start, the Lady Indians were able to rally back and cut Mullen’s lead to four late in the third quarter on a 3-pointer by senior Lauren Cooling.

With about two minutes remaining in the third, though, Mullen head coach Frank Cawley opted to run a stall offense that consisted of passes along the perimeter without a shot.

As a result, the Lady Mustangs ran nearly 1:45 of the clock before turning the ball over on a travel.

With 15 seconds left in the quarter, Montrose had a chance to cut the lead to two or even one, but Mullen freshman Autumn Burt stole the ball at halfcourt and converted it into an uncontested layup.

The Lady Indians were never the same the rest of the game, as they were unable to come any closer in the fourth quarter.

“That was a big one,” Mraule said.

All together, Montrose committed 16 turnovers and made 19 of 30 free throws. That percentage is also a bit misleading, five of those misses were on the front end of 1-and-1s.

Another part of the problem was that Montrose had spent all week preparing for Mullen’s zone defense, which it used last week to defeat  Fossil Ridge in the second round of the tournament. Instead of a zone, though, the Lady Mustangs used a full-court press the entire game, throwing MHS out of its offense from the get-go.

“We practiced against a zone all week and then they came out in a man-to-man, and we struggled to get our offense going,” senior Sydney Allen said. “We weren’t able to adjust like we should have.”

DeJulio and junior Rachel Hansen both led the Lady Indians with eight points.

 Friday’s loss was the final game for Montrose’s five seniors: Cooling, DeJulio, Allen, Stacia Holman and Tessa Sulivan.

The Lady Indians do return six players with significant varsity experience, including three seniors-to-be.

But while Mraule said he expects MHS to be as good or even better than this year’s squad, he said replacing the five seniors will an extremely difficult task.

“It’s always tough to see seniors go, but with these five it’s going to be really tough,” Mraule said. “We’ve got some big shoes to fill next year. I hate to see them go.”

Contact Robin Washut via e-mail at robinw@montrosepress.com