Thursday afternoon senior Key Rainey scored 24 points, and an effective Osbourn Park defense limited Manchester to 25% shooting as the Yellow Jackets won their second consecutive Class 6 state title, 48-42 over the Lancers.
The victory at Siegel Center in Richmond was Osbourn Park coach Chrissy Kelly’s fourth state title in her coaching career.
“I’m extremely proud of this group,” said Kelly, who also won two state titles at Forest Park. “They’re phenomenal, just a phenomenal group of young women that I’m very privileged and fortunate to coach.”
Rainey helped propel her team to a phenomenal start, scoring the Yellow Jackets’ first ten points as Osbourn Park went up 16-2 early. Manchester stabilized things, scoring the last five points of the first quarter and doing a better job defensively on Rainey and her team. At halftime Osbourn Park led 22-16, with Rainey having scored 16 total points.
“Thank God there was that run at the beginning because now at halftime, the thing was, we’re [still] up six,” Kelly said.
Rainey did pick up three fouls in the first half, however, and that became a big problem for Kelly’s team in the second half. With just over five minutes left in the third quarter Rainey, who had been carrying her team on offense, picked up her fourth foul. She went to the bench with her team leading 30-21.
Predictably, Manchester seized the momentum and went on a quick 5-0 run to tighten things up. With offensive production a question, Kelly’s team placed faith in their defense to hold the lead.
“Defend,” said Kelly, when asked what she told her team after a timeout. “It was just sustaining…when Key went out, one of the things we’ve focused on this year is our defense is our offense. So, there wasn’t panic when Key went out. We weren’t focused on the offensive side of the ball…just keep defending, you just gotta get stops.”
Osbourn Park (25-5) did get those, holding the Lancers to three points the last 3:28 of the third quarter. The Yellow Jackets started to get more offense from their other players as well. Junior Tierney Myers had five points in the quarter and Osbourn Park got to the free throw line eight times total in the third quarter. Going into the fourth, it was 36-29.
With her team up 37-31 early in the fourth, Myers continued to attack the basket and scored to make it 39-31. Then off a Manchester turnover junior Janey Salinas, who led her team in scoring in last year’s state championship win, hit her second three-pointer of the half to make it 42-31.
Manchester (26-2) rallied to make it 42-37, but by that time Rainey, who will play at Towson next year, was back in the game. Her jumper in the lane made it 46-39 a few minutes later, and that was all the points her team would need. While Manchester closed the gap to 46-42 with 1:21 left, the Osbourn Park defense tightened again and Manchester didn’t score again.
“As cliche as it sounds, defense wins championships,” Kelly said. “If you can defend you always have a chance.”
Myers finished with nine points and Salinas eight for Osbourn Park. Senior Jayel West added five points and eight rebounds, while sophomore guard Kai Jones, thrust into a bigger role after starting senior point guard Samia Snead was lost for the playoffs in the regional final, stepped up to play 24 solid minutes. She was crucial helping Rainey bring up the ball up the court. Senior Jaelyn Gorham didn’t score, but gave Kelly 25 minutes of physical defense, harassing the Lancers’ ball-handlers on the perimeter.
While Osbourn Park was always given a good chance to repeat as champions, it was never a given. One of last year’s starters, junior Payton Walters, suffered an ACL injury in April that kept her out for the year.
“This is my last year, they’re family to me,” said Rainey about her teammates. “It was just really important to finish it off strong in the way that we all wanted to. It was great to get it for Samia and Payton as well.”
–Chris Jollay