BY BRIAN HAMILTON
SEYMOUR – “I memorize the basics. Making strange faces. Tread slowly, for I know, there’s a thousand miles to go.”
“This is the night, this is the sound. Here comes the warm machine.”
The lyrics of the song “Warm Machine” by the alternative rock band “Bush” can resonate with most Lady Lions fans because this team has already been in the position of needing to win the region with a lower seed after losing the district semifinal to Grace Christian.
TKA’s Kyle Young (20) pulls up for one of her five three-pointers while Ezell-Harding’s Aaliyah Dixon (4) defends. Young finished with a game-high 19 points, Photo by Brian Hamilton
Just one season ago, The King’s Academy lost in the district semifinals to Grace Christian and then laid an egg against Providence Academy in the consolation game, which forced them to battle through the region tournament as the 4-seed before going on a run to reach the state championship game.
When Turnipseed left Grace Christian after a difficult loss to the Lady Rams two weeks ago, he echoed that his team needed to ‘memorize the basics’ in a sense that they have had to dig their way out of this same hole before.
“I just told them, ‘We’ve been here before,’ but let’s just not make it any harder than it already is,” Turnipseed said after the Grace Christian game.
Turnipseed has created somewhat of a ‘warm machine’ in Seymour throughout his five years as coach, in that it doesn’t matter what road they take, nor how they get there, TKA has become a mainstay in the state semifinals.
On Friday night, the Lady Lions took down an Ezell-Harding team that was undefeated until Valentine’s Day and who came into the game with a 30-2 record. TKA trailed for the most part of three quarters before coming alive in the fourth quarter to outscore Ezell-Harding 18-9 and come away with a 51-42 win, sending the Lady Lions to their fourth straight Final Four.
Skylar Walden (14) looks to operate against Ezell-Harding’s Serenity Barksdale (3) during the Lady Lions’ Elite 8 win. Photo by Brian Hamilton
“I told them at halftime to just keep getting stops,” said Turnipseed. “Just stack stops and we will eventually score the ball. We didn’t shoot the ball well in the first half, but I knew if we kept getting stops, eventually, we would start hitting shots soon.”
TKA has been a ‘machine’ in the sense that Turnipseed’s squads have continued to advance to the Final 4, despite the road they have to take to get there. Regardless of the fact that the Lady Lions have gone a pedestrian 2-13 against district foe CAK since the Turnipseed era, they still find a way to land themselves on the game’s biggest stage in March.
Some may have made ‘strange faces’ when they saw TKA down 17 points in the Silverdale Academy in the region quarterfinal just over one week ago, but the team battled back, persevered and has still not faltered since that adversity.
Kyle Young put TKA on the board first with a three from the right wing, but Ezell-Harding would sink a three on the other end to tie the score at 3-3.
Aaliyah Dixon hit a basket to give Ezell-Harding a 5-3 lead, but Young hit a corner three — her second of the game — to put the Lady Lions in front 6-5 with 5:25 left in the first quarter.
Dixon and Young appeared to be going back and forth early on, as Dixon nailed a three-pointer to put the Lady Eagles ahead 8-6 midway through the first period.
TKA saw the Ezell-Harding lead swell to 12-6 before Young sank her third triple of the night, pulling the Lady Lions to within 12-9 with 2:23 remaining.
A layup by Jenny Bitounou, followed by a steal and layup by Olivia Loveday would put TKA back in front 13-12 with 48 seconds left, but Kaylen Kenny would nail a three from the left wing at the buzzer, which gave the Lady Eagles a 15-13 lead after one quarter.
Skylar Walden finally got on the board early in the second quarter, hitting a three to give the Lady Lions a 16-15 lead. Serenity Barksdale would split a pair of free throws to tie the game at 16-16 and the game was locked at 18-18 before Kyndal Armstrong nailed a three to give Ezell-Harding a 21-18 lead with 3:18 to go in the first half.
The Lady Eagles’ lead ballooned to 25-18 when Alaya Owens scored a layup with just over one minute remaining. At that point, it looked like the game might be slipping away from TKA.
TKA head coach Dante Turnipseed gives instructions to his team in a timeout during the fourth quarter of TKA’s 52-41 Elite 8 win. Photo by Brian Hamilton
Young drove the lane and made a layup while being fouled with 15 seconds left. The senior missed the free throw, but Ezell-Harding thankfully missed a three at the first-half buzzer to mitigate any more damage, as TKA went to the half trailing 25-20.
It appeared that Kyle Young was going to have to carry the load for the Lady Lions, as the Ezell-Harding defense continued to give TKA star Skylar Walden fits in the first half, limiting her to just three points in the first half.
Young seemed fine with that, as the senior came out and hit a layup to open the third quarter, trimming the Ezell-Harding lead to 25-22. A layup by Adit Kuol would close the gap to within 26-24 with 4:53 left in the period.
Walden then came down on a fast break and pulled up like Stephon Curry, from roughly 5-feet beyond the three-point line, and buried a triple to put TKA back in front 27-26.
“It definitely felt good,” Walden said of seeing a three go down in the second half. “It’s encouraging when you’re not hitting that much, but I also just knew that it was better (to pull up), because they’re a very athletic team, so going into the paint is a lot harder, so I felt there was a better chance there, but seeing one go in was definitely encouraging.”
Dixon would ‘one-up’ Walden’s three with one of her own to give Ezell-Harding a 29-27 lead, but Young answered with her fourth three of the game to give TKA a 30-29 lead with 2:28 left in the third quarter.
Walden hit her second three of the game to stretch the Lady Lion lead to 33-29, but a jumper by Brilee Price, followed by a pair of Armstrong free throws would end the third quarter at a 33-33 stalemate.
The King’s Academy decidedly saved its best quarter for last, as Olivia Loveday sank a three to open the period, giving the Lady Lions a 36-33 lead.
Armstrong hit a jumper to pull the Lady Eagles to within 36-35, but another Walden three stretch the TKA lead to 39-35 with 5:25 remaining.
A layup by Kuol, followed by a Kyle Young three-pointer — her fifth of the game — extended the TKA lead to 44-35 with just under four minutes left in the game.
Price scored a basket to cut the Lady Lion lead to 44-37, but Walden would answer on the next possession, hitting a layup to stretch the lead back to 46-37.
The Lady Lions continued to play sound, fundamental basketball in the fourth quarter, as TKA seemed to limit turnovers and mitigate early mistakes that helped them to dig a hole.
TKA grabbed its biggest lead of the game when Skylar Walden drove the lane for a layup to put the Lady Lions ahead 51-39 with under one minute remaining.
The Lady Lions would go on to win 51-42 to advance to their fourth consecutive Final Four.
While Skylar Walden is typically the leading scorer for TKA, the unsung hero on Friday night was senior guard Kyle Young, who finished with 19 points and hit five three-pointers in the contest.
“I kind of realized when we were at halftime that we needed to step it up,” Young said after the game. “They’re a good team, so I definitely think the hype (from the crowd) helped out and helped us pull it out.”
Walden finished with 17 points, with 14 coming in the second half, while Adit Kuol added eight points.
“I definitely feel like we came together and we kind of all said to each other that this is our last game and we have 20 minutes left and we don’t want to go out here and regret not giving it our all and missing out on another great opportunity that we’ve been able to do for the past few years,” Walden said. “I think at halftime it really hit and it was like, we can’t give up at halftime. We have to keep pushing and give it all we have, because if we win, we don’t play again until next Friday, but if you lose, you’re done. I think we just came together and played as hard as we could for the last 20 minutes.”
Ezell-Harding was led by Kyndal Armstrong’s 12 points, while Brilee Price finished with eight.
The Lady Lions have been here before, as every member of the roster has been to a Final Four and most of the seniors don’t understand how a season ends without reaching this stage.
While TKA has been at this stage before and has inched closer every year, Turnipseed and the girls know that there is a process to achieve their goals, the same goals this team has had the last four years.
“Tread slowly, for I know, there’s a thousand miles to go.”
The King’s Academy (27-8) will start treading those miles on Friday afternoon when they face Providence Christian (26-5) at 3:30 p.m. C.T. at F&M Bank Arena in Clarksville, Tenn.