Doral girls fall in Junior Orange Bowl final; Palmetto tops Belen in boys

After turning in some great work in battling their way to the Junior Orange Bowl championship game, trying to beat a team ranked No. 5 in the nation proved just a little too much for the Doral Academy girls’ basketball team on Tuesday night.

The Firebirds knocked off George Rogers Clark (KY) on Saturday before upsetting Purcell Marian from Cincinnati, Ohio (the 2023 tournament champion) 74-58 on Monday to land themselves in the title game of the Junior Orange Bowl Basketball Classic for the first time.

But Doral had no answer for St. Johns College School from Washington, D.C. or its superstar guard Morgan Stewart as the Firebirds wound up on the short end of a 77-57 final at the tournament’s new venue - Belen Jesuit.

With former Doral coach Allison Bustamante and former University of Miami men’s coach Jim Larranaga looking on, the Firebirds fell behind 11-0 just three minutes into the game and found themselves trying to play catch-up the rest of the night.

“We obviously knew what we were up against tonight, but I’m proud of my girls because all I could ask them to do was continue to fight no matter what the score was,” said first year Doral coach Daniela Barrios, who replaced Bustamante after she became the new head coach at Barry University last spring. “The only way you get better is by playing the best teams out there and there aren’t too many teams better than the one we played on that floor tonight.”

Led by seniors Stephanie Vega and Ashley Martinez, Doral battled back and reeled off a 7-0 run to close out the first half to go in trailing St. Johns 32-27. But Stewart, a senior and Florida State commit, proved to be virtually unstoppable. She went on a personal 7-0 run early in the third quarter as St. Johns built its lead back up to 56-40 by the end of the third quarter and went on to lead all scorers in the game with 27 points. Her teammate, Camille Nesmith, an SMU commit also did major damage scoring 20 while pulling down nine boards.

On the plus side for Doral, it proved to be a historic night for Martinez. With 5:18 left in the game, she drained her fifth three-pointer and with that, became the third girls’ player in Miami-Dade County history to cross the 2,000 point barrier joining Miami Country Day’s Maria Alvarez and Bustamante, who is still the record holder with 2,500 points in the late 90s.

Martinez began her high school career as a sixth grader at Keys Gate Charter before transferring to Somerset Silver Palms before eventually joining Bustamante at Doral two years ago as a sophomore.

“It feels pretty cool for sure, especially getting to do it with Stephanie (Vega) out there as well because we’ve been together since the fifth grade,” said Martinez who finished the night with 18 points while Vega led the way for the Firebirds with 22 points. “As far as tonight was concerned, it was frustrating because we felt coming in that we could stay with them and challenge them, but the rough start had us playing uphill the rest of the night and they’re a tough team to do that against.”

As far was what’s ahead for Barrios and her Firebirds? The loss dropped them to 11-5 but only because of a challenging schedule and they have their sights clearly set on a third straight trip to the state final four where they suffered defeats in the state semifinals each of the last two years.

Playing a lot of good teams going forward.

“Everything we’re doing now is with one thing in mind, to get back to the state final four,” Barrios said. “That’s where the bar is set for this program now, and hopefully we can bring home the title this time.”

PALMETTO TAKES THIRD

It’s not the easiest thing in the world to walk into the Belen Jesuit gym and knock off the Wolverines on their home floor. But that’s exactly what Palmetto did on Tuesday night.

Led by junior center Sebastian Medera, Palmetto defeated Belen 63-54. Now all they have to do is turn around and do it again – next week.

In an odd quirk, having already scheduled a regular season game on Jan. 7 against each other, the brackets in the tournament wound up bringing them together on Tuesday. Both teams won their first round games against out of town teams on Saturday before each dropped their semifinal contests on Monday.

“We don’t mind it one bit,” Palmetto coach Alex Ordoqui said. “I think next week will be interesting because this game tonight was kind of a quick 24-hour turnaround. Now we’ll have a full week to get ready for each other and it’s always a challenge playing Chachi (Belen head coach Gaston “Chachi” Rodriguez) and his group of kids. There are only so many coaches down here that are as good as Chachi is and obviously when you have opponents like this……these are the games you want to play. Some of the games you win by lopsided scores aren’t as fun and challenging. It’s games like this that you really get better, and tonight we got better.”

The Panthers improved to 12-3 and are hoping that somehow, some way they could challenge Region 4-7A giant and four-time reigning state champion Columbus when mid-February arrives.

In the meantime, they left the Belen gym a satisfied group thanks mainly to the efforts of Madera, Jaiden Horton, Corey Gellineau and Samfree Sarante who all scored in double figures. Madera led the way with 19 points along with 8 rebounds and was named to the All-Tournament team as he enjoyed big performances against Bonner Prendie (PA) and St. Johns College School (D.C.) in the first two games. Horton, Gellineau and Sarante followed with 15, 13 and 10 points, respectively.

“We were disappointed with the loss to St. Johns last night (81-54) so really just wanted to make sure we came out here tonight with a lot of energy and find a way to get this thing done,” Madera said. “We’re looking forward to next week, we’re excited. Belen is a big challenge for us. Now we know what they’re going to bring and just go out there and see if we can do this again.”

After a close first half that saw Palmetto take a 31-29 lead to the locker room, the Panthers, thanks to some sharp shooting from Horton and Gellineau and strong inside play from Madera went on a 16-5 run to open the second half to lead 47-34 and Belen (11-3) never got closer than seven the rest of the way.

The Wolverines, whose tallest player is 6-3, rely heavily on the three point shot, but it was a cold night from beyond the arc as they went just 5-of-19. Orlando Roche led the way with 22 points.

“The third quarter was huge,” Ordoqui said. “I thought our offensive rebounding was huge which got us two or three chances at the basket each time down the floor. Our guys then really bared down and got stops and we were able to extend the lead. Sebastian (Madera) brings so much to the table. He started in this program as a freshman and his growth has been tremendous to watch every day. He’s a kid that deserves everything good that comes to him.”

MORE RESULTS

Boys’ championship - Lakota West (OH) 77, St. Johns College School (D.C.) 60; Girls’ 3rd Place – Purcell Marian (OH) 58, Olmsted Falls (OH) 54.

Boys 5th Place – Bonner Prendie (PA) 78, Mater Lakes Academy 67: Junior guard Khanye Moss finished 8-of-13 from the floor including four three-pointers while making 10-of-13 free throws to lead all scorers in the game with 30 points. Mater Lakes is 11-4.

Girls 5th Place – George Rogers Clark (KY) 59, Plantation American Heritage 41: With his top two players, Jasleen Green and Ta’Niyah Davis having transferred out before the season to Boca Raton Grandview Prep and Oakland Park Northeast, respectively, it’s been a little bit of a humbling start for head coach Greg Farias and American Heritage..

Participating in the Junior OB tournament for the first time, Heritage, which has a string of nine consecutive appearances in the state championship game (including 5 straight titles from 2018 to 2022) going, will be challenged to make it 10 as they fell to 8-6 with the lopsided loss to the team from Winchester, Kentucky. Heritage, which was led by Isabella Aloisio and Yinuo Wang with 15 points each, was never in it, falling behind 23-7 after one quarter and 38-15 at the half.

Boys 7th Place – Florida Christian 69, Miami Westminster Christian 39: The Patriots jumped all over the Warriors early and led 39-15 at the half enroute to the running clock victory. FC (9-5) was led by the duo of Rasmus Olop and Tavarus Greene who scored 21 and 17 points, respectively.

Girls 7th Place – Homestead Keys Gate Charter 64, Miami SLAM Academy 20: Essence Gibbs dominated the floor as she scored 23 points (going 7-of-15 from the floor and 9-of-10 from the free throw line) as Keys Gate rolled to the easy win.