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LOGAN — Fouled out of last year's 4A girls state championship game, Ridgeline's Emilee Skinner was forced to look on helplessly from the bench as the Riverhawks fell short to Desert Hills in double overtime.
On Saturday afternoon, Skinner spent the final seconds watching from the bench again. This time, however, it was a much more comfortable viewing experience — business was already taken care of by then.
Inside the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum on the campus of Utah State University, Ridgeline did what it has all year — eviscerate its opponent — and defeated region foe Sky View 67-43 to clinch its first-ever 4A girls basketball state championship and finish the season 25-0.
"About a year ago today, we didn't get the results that we wanted," Skinner said. "But like we all wanted to, we just went out and got it done. So I'm super proud of our team."
The game was never competitive, either. Ridgeline jumped on the Bobcats from the get-go, forced 12 first-half turnovers and led 38-17 at halftime. Skinner had 28 points on 10-of-17 shooting, Elise Livingston added 12 points, and the Riverhawks put an exclamation mark on its undefeated season.
"We never actually talked about being undefeated," Ridgeline head coach Ainsli Jenks said. "We went out of preseason, the girls were like, 'We're 12-0.' Then we went to the region talking about (going) 10-0. Then we come here, we go 3-0; that's pretty awesome. So we just kind of broke it up and went for it. It doesn't happen very often. Super proud of these ladies."
Rocking shiny green pants for the occasion, Jenks joked about how she likes to "embarrass" her team with flashy outfits on game days. For the majority of the year, though, it was her team doing the embarrassing.
The Riverhawks won eight games by at least 40 points and gave 5A's Bountiful its only loss on the year. It dismantled the best teams in Idaho during a winter tournament and handled rival Green Canyon 74-33 in the tournament semifinals. Ridgeline built a reasonable argument of being one of the best teams in the state, classification aside.
But perhaps the most intimidating thing about the team was that Ridgeline's production consists almost entirely of sophomores and juniors. Skinner, a sophomore, averaged 20.9 points per game and has multiple Division I offers. Juniors Elise Livingston and Hallee Smith averaged 13.3 and 10.9 points per game, respectively.
The three players rose to their skill level on Saturday afternoon in front of a well-attended, split Cache Valley crowd that filled nearly half the arena.
Skinner and Livingston both knocked down early 3-pointers, Smith stole the ball and finished with a layup, and the Hawks sprung out to a 15-4 lead and never looked back. Despite being a team so accustomed to winning big, there was never a lack of urgency.
"I mean, in practice, we have our intense practices. We work really, really hard and keep up the intensity," Jenks said. "I've said it a million times. They're so competitive, so they just love to win. They love to compete. They love to play hard."
Credit the No. 2 seed Sky View for reaching the final; it wasn't any easy path. The Bobcats lost one of its best players, senior Melanie Hiatt, to injury early in the season.
After going 15-6 in the regular season, the Bobcats had to eke out a win over Mountain Crest and then overcome a double-digit second-half deficit to No. 3 Snow Canyon on Friday night. Hannah Radford hit a buzzer-beating 3-pointer to clinch a 59-57 semifinal win to reach the title game.
"You know, if you would have told me four months ago, Hey, you're gonna lose one of your main contributors and still make the championship game, I'd take it," Sky View head coach Vannesa Hall said.
In the title game, the Bobcats battled throughout the game and was outscored just 29-26 in the second half. Radford finished with 17 points to cap off her strong tournament effort, Jocee Chadwick added 8 points and Karlee Allen had 5 points.
The day belonged to Ridgeline, though, who dominated the game and the season.
"Ridgeline's circled on people's calendars," Jenks said. "We knew that people wanted to come and beat us, and so I think just really focusing on work and effort. We set the tone, we get out there, and that was a huge focus this year."
And with the entire starting five returning?
"Better watch out next year, too," Skinner said.
