OGDEN — For the American Fork Cavemen, the key to earning a berth to the 5A state championship game — their first in more than a decade — was playing strong defense for all 32 minutes of their semifinal matchup with Murray.
With the Murray Spartans boasting one of the classification's strongest offenses, scoring 60.3 points per game, as well as 5A's fourth-best individual scorer in David Collette, who averages 22.13 points a game, limiting the Spartans' scoring opportunities seemed like it could be a difficult task.
American Fork head coach Doug Meacham found a strategy that worked, and the Cavemen held Murray well below its season average and earned the 50-41 win at the Dee Events Center on Friday afternoon.
"I thought our defensive pressure on the other guys — other than Collette — was really good," Meacham said. "We knew that Collette was that good of a player that he's going get shots, he's going to shoot those tough 20-footers and knock them down. So I was proud of our other guys' defensive effort."
Collette did hit those shots, finishing with a game-high 24 points in addition to five rebounds, four blocks and a steal. But the Cavemen held all other Murray players to single digits. The Spartans shot just 23.1 percent in the first half, 30.4 percent for the game, and Riley Grandinetti, the Spartans' second-highest scorer at 8.8 points per game, was scoreless.
"The key stat in our game was, Austin Waddoups defended Riley (Grandinetti) and he was 0-for-8 from the field," Meacham said, "and that was huge."
Grandinetti totaled four rebounds, three assists, two steals and two turnovers.
American Fork (20-4), which didn't even make the state tournament last season and was just 3-18 two years ago, started the game with an 11-3 run over the first five minutes of the game and never trailed or allowed the Spartans to tie it from that point on. Collette hit a 3-pointer to pull within two points, 33-31, with 1:30 left in the third quarter, but Daniel Beddes started scoring for the Cavemen and Murray could never climb any closer.
"A rebounder and defender," Beddes said when asked what his role on the team has been this season. "But I have my moments; I can get a couple (points) in sometimes."
The 6-foot-5 junior scored all six of his points in a minute and a half early in the fourth quarter to put the game out of reach for good.
"It was a big moment to get a couple baskets in a row," he said.
Despite Murray's height advantage with Collette inside and American Fork's Nate Ensign spending much of his time on the bench in foul trouble, the Cavemen outscored the Spartans in the paint, 28-16, and had more second-chance points (10-6) with fewer offensive rebounds (14-7).
The Cavemen did shoot poorly from the foul line, finishing just 3-for-10 and not making any until Quincy Bair hit three in a row in the final 30 seconds.
"If we had been able to hit more free throws in this game it wouldn't be so close in the end, but I thought our guys did well," Meacham said.
Bair, a junior, led American Fork with 20 points, six rebounds, and two seals while Marcel Davis, also a junior, added 10 points, six rebounds, eight assists and two steals.
The Cavemen will meet Region 4 foe Lone Peak in the championship game today at 1 p.m. It will be the third meeting for the teams this season with the Knights winning both of the previous matchups. Lone Peak won the first game by 15 points and the more recent contest by just seven, and Meacham is confident his team has the experience to make the 5A final an exciting event.
"I know who we're playing. I know that they're very good, they have a lot of options," he said. "The last times we played them they've had little spurts and they have such fire power at different positions that they can go on a run. Maintaining the runs, I think that's the key thing."
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