Both the boys' and girls' basketball teams from Charlotte Amalie High School advanced to the championship game with victories over Ivanna Eudora Kean High School in the Knight Quality Stations Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Tournament on Sunday at the UVI Sports and Fitness Center.
The Lady Chicken Hawks totally dominated the Lady Devil Rays in a one-sided game that ended with a score of 61-23. Tracy Browne and Janelle Sarauw led CAHS with 13 and 12 points respectively.
In the earlier girls' games, the Good Hope School took advantage of Antilles School. The Lady Falcons blew out the Lady Hurricanes by a score of 50-6. Jada Daniel had 16 points for Good Hope.
The Lady Barracudas of Educational Complex Vocational School beat their St. Croix public school counterpart, the Central High School Lady Caribs, 26-14. The Lady Caribs later defeated the Lady Hurricanes, 31-8. The Lady Barracudas followed Central's victory with one of their own in beating the Lady Falcons, 36-27, to advance to the championship game against the Lady Chicken Hawks.
All of the boys' games were closer contests. The first saw the Barracudas beat the Caribs, 52-37. In the second boys game, the Antilles Hurricanes held off a late run by the Good Hope Falcons to win, 54-41.
In the final game of the evening the Chicken Hawks made a heroic fourth-quarter comeback to defeat the Devil Rays, 55-52. The game was tied nine times and the crowd of nearly 2,000 was on its feet for the entire game.
The Devil Rays led 26-23 at the half. Naheem Mason had nine points to lead Eudora Kean's scoring at the half. Andrew Christian of CAHS equaled Mason with nine points of his own.
Chicken Hawks coach Pedrito Estrill felt his team had "too much individual play" in the first half. "We settled for too many long jump shots," he said.
The second half had no dull moments. After the Chicken Hawks tied the game at 30, Eudora Kean outscored them 10-4 in the final minutes of the third quarter for a 40-34 advantage.
The final quarter was as exciting as it gets, with four ties and three lead changes. The final minute took 20 minutes to play. The Devil Rays took a three-point lead with 1:03 left in the game, but the Chicken Hawks tied the game at 52 with 20 seconds remaining.
The Devil Rays' Eric Pitman was fouled six seconds later but missed both of his free throws. Eudora Kean used a full court press to try to get the ball back but the gambit backfired as the Chicken Hawks' Akim Lettsome drew a foul that sent him to the free throw line.
Lettsome missed the first free throw but sank the second to give his team a one-point lead with 10 seconds remaining.
After a time out, the Devil Rays tried to inbound the ball. But Shawn Luke, who had stepped up in the clutch for the Devil Rays all game, threw the ball out of bounds.
The Devil Rays quickly fouled Chicken Hawks' point guard Steve Gardener, but Gardener drained both free throws. Eudora Kean's Pitman threw up a half-court shot at the buzzer that missed the mark.
Eudora Kean coach Joel Fleming said of his team, "They got a little flustered and lost their composure."
But even so, he said, "It was a great game."
