By Terry Boehmker
NKyTribune sports reporter
Holy Cross girls basketball players can turn their attention to the All “A” Classic girls state basketball tournament once again after a 66-42 win over Dixie Heights on their home court Thursday.
The Indians are one of four local teams that reached the semifinals of the girls and boys state tournaments last week before everything was postponed by arctic weather conditions that swept across the state. The final rounds were rescheduled for Sunday at Owensboro Sportscenter.
The girls semifinal matchups will be Brossart (20-1) vs. Owensboro Catholic (15-13) at 8 a.m. and Holy Cross (17-2) vs. Lexington Christian (16-5) at 9:30 a.m. with the winners playing in the championship game at 3 p.m.
The boys games on Sunday are Walton-Verona (13-7) vs. Caverna (14-5) at 11 a.m. and Newport (14-4) vs. Lyon County (15-5) in the semifinals with the championship game set for 4:30 p.m.
All of those tipoff times are Central Standard Time, which is one hour behind Eastern Standard Time in Northern Kentucky.
In this week’s statewide media poll, Holy Cross was voted No. 14 and Brossart No. 16 in the girls rankings. That makes them the favorites to reach the All “A” Classic final on Sunday.
After a six-day layoff without a game due to school closings caused by the weather, Holy Cross turned in a solid team effort in the win over Dixie Heights on Thursday.
The Indians shot 42 percent (26 of 62) from the field with eight 3-point goals and had three double-figure scorers in junior guard Alyssa Arlinghaus (20), sophomore point guard Jai Johnson (17) and junior forward Riley Eberhard (16).
Dixie Heights stayed close until the fourth quarter when the Colonels were outscored, 18-2, and ended the game with more turnovers (22) than field goals (14). Their leading scorers were junior guard Asia Carter with 16 points and sophomore guard Peyton Gibson with 15.
“I wanted to play a game before Sunday. I thought that was important,” said Holy Cross coach Ted Arlinghaus. “So now we’ll practice (Friday), do a little walk-through on Saturday and then head down Saturday afternoon … and hopefully we can come away with two more wins.”
Brossart’s girls will play a 37th District seeding game at Scott on Friday before making a return trip to the All “A” Classic. The Mustangs will be facing Owensboro Catholic on its home court in their Sunday morning semifinal.
In her team’s first two tournament victories, Brossart sophomore guard Kylie Smith scored a total of 37 points, shot 48.2 percent (14 of 29) from the field and made 16 steals. She’s currently averaging 18.7 points per game.
The Walton-Verona boys team did not have any games this week due to the weather. Newport went 1-1 in back-to-back 36th District seeding games with a loss to Newport Central Catholic on Wednesday and a win over Bellevue on Thursday.
The two brothers in Walton-Verona’s starting lineup, Clay and Wyatt Shearer, had matching totals of 29 points and 16 rebounds in two state tournament wins last week.