By: Nick Hall
Three of the four quarters were close, and Fyffe won two of those. The third quarter was a different story altogether and cost the Red Devils a shot at the final four in Birmingham. Sacred Heart opened a 5-point lead over Fyffe just one minute into the opening period, but if the Cardinals thought it was going to be easy, they soon learned it wasn’t. Fyffe’s defense clamped down and Sacred Heart only managed one 2-point basket over the remaining seven minutes of the period. During that same span, a basket from downtown by Gabe Gardener, combined with a couple of free throws from Tucker Goolesby and Parker Godwin, tightened the score to 7-5 at the end of one. Just over a minute into the second period, Tucker Goolesby tied the game at 7-7 with a layup. The Cardinals answered with a 6-point run to go up 13-7 with 3:29 to go in the first half. Over the next minute, Austin Buster and Gardner, each knocked down a trey to tie the game at 13-all with 2:28 left in the half. A Tate Goolesby foul sent Aaron Moore to the line to shoot two with :04 remaining on the first half clock. Moore was good on both, and it looked as though the Cardinals would take a slim, 2-point advantage into the locker room when Parker Godwin hit a layup at the buzzer to knot the halftime score at 15-15. The third period saw Sacred Heart outscore Fyffe 19-8, mostly off the shooting of highly touted recruit Jayden Stone. A little over halfway into the period, the Cardinals had opened a 14-point lead from which the Red Devils would never recover. Fyffe got the lid back on the bottle in the final period, winning the fourth by one point, but the damage had already been done and Sacred Heart advanced to finals with a 47-37 win. Godwin led Fyffe with 13 points on the night followed by Gardner who scored seven. Austin Buster and Tucker Goolesby netted five each while Micah Johnson had three. Tate Goolesby and Brody Dalton scored two points each. “I would love to have one more game,” said Fyffe coach Neal Thrash. “But I am so proud of this team and it’s accomplishments. We played in five tournaments this year and one three of them. The only two losses were against the No. 1 team in 3A and one of those went to the wire. Nobody likes to play defense, but our guys did it. We just had trouble scoring the last couple of games and it cost us.”