WEST VALLEY CITY — The Highland Rams might want to open a chop shop, because in winning the boys 4A state basketball crown Friday night, they dismantled in a hurry what had been a well-oiled Provo Bulldogs machine.
In holding off the Region 7 champions 56-45 to win the school's seventh state basketball title, the Rams were in charge most of the way by not allowing the Bulldogs to do what they had done so well the previous three tournament games.
The Rams shut down four of Provo's starters by holding them to only 4-of-22 shooting and won the battle of getting to the free-throw line — where Highland outscored Provo 20-9.
"We wanted them to play our kind of game and didn't want to let them dictate what kind of game it was going to be," said Rams senior forward Jake Orchard, who was named tournament MVP.
Orchard scored a team-high 16 points and hit all six of his free-throw attempts, but his biggest contribution might have been his ability to get Provo's big men in foul trouble. Bulldogs' senior power forward Tanner Gregory, who scored one point on 0-of-3 shooting, spent most of the game on the bench in foul trouble and ended up fouling out with seven minutes remaining in the game.
  | |
"I've always been a driver and that's always been my thing to get to the free-throw line," Orchard said.
Highland coach Keith West and Provo coach Craig Drury both admitted that having Provo's big men in foul trouble hurt the Bulldogs significantly.
"Those are the breaks of the game and you have to play through them," Drury said. "We just didn't have it today in the right places, and they did."
West said his team's strategy was to take away Provo's inside game and take their chances with the Bulldogs' perimeter offense. The Rams sagged on defense and tried to take away the inside gaps and passing lanes — because West had noticed that Provo's interior passing was lethal in the first three playoff games.
"We didn't worry so much about the outside shot, we just were not going to let them beat us inside," West said. "We just had a lot of people helping out and we have a lot of tough guys on defense, and we can go a lot deeper there than Provo can."
The strategy worked, not only in helping to draw fouls but in keeping Provo's scoring down. The Bulldogs shot only 35 percent in the second half and hit only 4 of 14 3-point shots. Provo's only lead was an early 4-2 margin and it trailed by as many as 14 points.
The third quarter, however, was the real killer. After the Bulldogs had trimmed an eight-point lead down to four at halftime, the Rams came out with Travis Tucker nailing a 3-pointer and Steve Panos throwing in a hook to quickly take a 32-23 lead.
It wasn't Highland's offense that did the damage, however, but the defense. Provo's only two points of the period came with 55 seconds left when Kenyn Koop popped in a baseline jumper.
"We played such good defense in the third quarter and just didn't allow them to do anything they wanted to do, and I felt like that was the difference in the game," Orchard said.
Even with Gregory on the bench, the Bulldogs still made a game of it in the final period, mainly because Koop went into his attack-the-basket mode. Behind an 8-0 run, spurred by back-to-back 3-point plays from junior center Chris Collinsworth, Provo cut Highland's lead to 45-40 with three minutes remaining.
But the Rams responded with two layups by Braeden Brown and another by Orchard to race back out to a double-digit lead. West credited point guard Elliott Grow with helping the Rams regain their composure.
"I told him it was his show and to take over," West said.
Grow responded by hitting 6 of 7 free throws late, and he also dished out three assists with no turnovers.
"It was the most important game I've played in, so I felt like I had to step and be a leader," Grow said.
Provo's only bright spot offensively was the play of Collinsworth, who scored 14 of Provo's first 17 points. Despite playing the entire fourth quarter with four fouls, he finished with a game-high 20 points on 8-of-10 shooting.
E-mail: jimr@desnews.com