"We're really excited," Sparks coach Dick Lee said. "These kids have never played in a big arena."
Sparks will play Incline at 5 p.m. to decide who the tournament winner is and who will go to state with the first seed. Sparks played Incline three times during the season and won one of the games. Sparks lost 80-76 in early December, and 51-48 on Jan. 11. On Jan. 30, Sparks handed the Highlanders a big loss, winning 74-56.
The eight seniors on the Railroaders squad have never made it this far in playoffs and are thrilled to be there. Although a second-place seed in state would be just fine, Lee says it's not quite what the team is looking for.
"We're going to try and finish off what we started on November 10," he said.
Sparks earned the berth into the finals by beating the Dayton Dust Devils Friday night, an opponent who defeated them twice during the regular season. The first time the two teams played this season, Dayton defeated the Railroaders 51-47 on Jan. 18. The second time around, Sparks lost on the road 58-51 last Saturday. However, Friday night Sparks gained an early lead and maintained it through the game to beat the Dust Devils 53-42.
Sparks earned its first point of the game off a technicality, literally. Dayton's Jerrin Foster was not listed on the official roster for the game and Sparks was awarded two free throws from the technical foul issued to Dayton. Zack Quilici made one of the two shots for the Railroaders, giving them an automatic lead.
Julaney Perkins scored a bucket for Dayton to take the lead at 2-1, but Quilici got an offensive board and a layup to retake the lead, 3-2. Sparks kept the lead the rest of the game.
After a low scoring half, Sparks had a four-point advantage going into the third quarter, 19-15. Angel Guillen closed out the quarter with a jumper that put Sparks ahead by nine going into the final quarter.
Dayton started off the fourth quarter by scoring six straight points to get within three of the Railroaders, 33-36. Sparks held steady and worked its way back into a 10-point lead as Jay Nichols completed a 3-point play with just over two minutes left in the quarter. Albert Claypool got two late offensive rebounds and scored three points off the second chance points to ensure Sparks' victory over Dayton, 53-42.
"The intensity was great," Coach Lee said. "We really never let up in our effort. We were never inconsistent in our effort."
Sparks had to pull out all the stops and change up its play against Dayton to get a victory for this third meeting.
"We tried to stop the two players (Hans) Myer and (Tannar) Wood," Lee said. "We really sat in a zone and packed that in and rotated a little bit depending on where the ball was."
Wood scored 11 points for the Dust Devils and Sparks held Myer to just nine points.
Lee said although Dayton is a good squad, it is hard for a team to beat an opponent three times.
"Dayton always plays well against us," he said. "It's hard to beat quality teams. They're very good and very good at what they do."
A key to the Railroaders' victory was impeccable offense.
"We had big shots," the Railroaders coach said. "We had excellent passing by Zack (Quilici) and Angel (Guillen) in the third and fourth quarters."
Quilici had a game-high 20 points. Guillen had 14 and Albert Claypool chipped in with 11.
The team played well overall and did a great job on rebounds. Jay Nichols especially did a good job on defensive rebounds, Lee said.
"We made some free throws at the end. Albert (Claypool) had two big offensive rebounds but the game was pretty much decided at that point," Lee said.
Sparks made 12 of 18 free throws, 66 percent.
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