CSA Fodrea’s bench comes off the floor in celebration after winning the BCSC EBL boys championship game held at Columbus East Feb. 5, 2022.
Greg Jones | For The Republic
After the Parkside girls defended the Elementary Basketball League title they won in 2020, the Parkside boys looked as if they would do the same when they led at halftime of Saturday’s championship game.
Keatin Roberts and his CSA-Fodrea teammates had other ideas.
Roberts scored 12 points in a 14-0 third-quarter advantage that put the Falcons in control of the boys game. Parkside made a spirited comeback, but Fodrea held on for a 34-33 victory for its first EBL title in school history.
“My dad just said, ‘Turn it up,’ so I had to turn it up for the city and come out and play,” Roberts said. “It’s crazy. It’s awesome. Our coach said it’s championship season this year.”
The Pirates led 17-14 at halftime, but went scoreless in the third quarter, allowing the Falcons to take a 28-17 lead. Parkside got back to within 34-31 on back-to-back baskets by Cayden Goodwin and got the ball back, but missed a shot and two free throws.
A pair of free throws by Jake Roeder cut the lead to one with 6.8 seconds remaining. After Roberts missed the front end of a one-and-one, Roeder grabbed the rebound, and after turnovers by each team, the Pirates shot for a win fell well short.
“I was nervous,” Roberts said. “My heart was beating fast.”
Roberts finished with a game-high 17 points for Fodrea. Jacob Thomas added 10 points and five rebounds.
“This (title) is long overdue,” Fodrea coach Durrell Linzy added. “We just had to stick to playing Fodrea Falcon basketball. The name of our game is get out in the open floor, and play some defense.”
Goodwin led Parkside with eight points. Carson Gallion grabbed eight rebounds to lead the Pirates to a 33-19 advantage on the boards.
“This is a simple game,” Parkside coach Bob Moats said. “The team that puts the thing in the other thing more times than the other guy wins. The other guys loses. They did it more than we did, and they did a great job doing it.
“We beat them in overtime (during the regular season), so this was going to be 15 rounds of a heavyweight fight,” he added. “This is a big game for the Fodrea community. I’m just glad that we could be part of a great game. Both these teams played their hearts out, played their guts out.”
The Pirates won the title in 2020. Last year’s tournament was canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I couldn’t be prouder of this group of young men, for what they’ve done this year and what they’ve done over the last two years for us,” Moats said. “At they end of the day, they just really did get better over the last two years to get better as players.”
The girls championship game, meanwhile, was never in doubt. Parkside jumped out to a 13-0 lead after one quarter and never looked back on its way to a 44-12 win against Richards.
Claire Finney scored nine of those first-quarter points for the Pirates and finished with a career-high 27.
“I could finish my layups easier,” Finney said. “I was more in control. I was more focused, and I think our team was more focused, too. I think we’ve all worked hard for it, and we practice really hard. I didn’t think we would actually do it, but I’m really proud of all of us.”
Emery McClellan added 11 points for Parkside. Finney grabbed eight rebounds to lead the Pirates to a 31-22 advantage on the boards.
Hadley Andreson led the Raiders with six points. Fatima Aguilar grabbed 10 rebounds.
Richards played without Isabell Kinter, who injured her foot in Monday’s quarterfinal game. The Raiders beat Taylorsville 25-8 in Saturday morning’s semifinals behind 17 points from Andreson.
“(Parkside is) a real good team,” Richards coach Richard Macy said. “We’re short one of our good offensive players and defensive players. The team did a good job of playing without her this morning, but we just came up against a good team, experienced team (in the afternoon). I knew what we had to play against, and two snow days didn’t help where we didn’t have practice. But I’m proud of them.”
Parkside beat Mt. Healthy 25-4 in the semifinals, with Finney leading the way with 13 points. The Pirates now have won titles the last three years the tournament has been contested.
“I was really proud of them,” Parkside coach Kanen Hashman said. “We worked really hard all season long. We had a goal on Day 1 of practice to try to go undefeated. We had a couple of girls that were managers on that team two years ago that went undefeated, and from the beginning of the year, they said they wanted to do the same thing they did. They worked hard all season long to go 13-0.”
