Our Regional All A win gave us an automatic bid to the All A State Tournament, held in our great state's capital: Frankfort. The first game was held at 7:30 am on a Wednesday morning! Justin and the team headed to Frankfort after school on Tuesday, and had to get up at 5:00 in the morning to be ready for their game. Imagine getting that many teenage girls up and at 'em that early. I stayed at home with Hadley and Canaan, because Justin and the girls were coming home later that afternoon, win or lose. I listened to the game on the radio, while I was at school. My school kids and I cheered on the team to a victory!
For the next round of games, I skipped school, packed our bags, and headed to Frankfort. Justin's mom, Cathy, came with us and the four of us stayed in a hotel room together just a couple of doors down from Justin and one of his assistant coaches. I knew Justin would be pretty stressed out with thinking about ballgames and making sure all his girls were behaving and going to sleep at night and all that. So I figured it was in Justin's best interest if we not stay in a room with him anyway. We had the best time, though. Hadley loved hanging out with all the girls in their hotel rooms and both kids just ran up and down the hallway, going from one room to the next.
We kept winning ballgames at this tournament and made it all the way to the State Finals! This was the first time in the school's history for the girl's team to even be in the state tournament, much less make it to the finals! Our crowd was huge, which was so neat since Frankfort is over two hours from Glasgow. Glasgow has the best fans ever.
Our final game was very close but we were able to defeat Danville High School, in the end, and won the All A State Tournament.
Shalika was named the MVP of the entire tournament! So proud of that sweet girl. She will attend Western Kentucky University, this fall, on a full basketball scholarship. We will be there to cheer her on, too.
The trophy that the team received was huge; as tall as Hadley is now. Justin says they are going to need additional trophy case space to display all their memorabilia from this year. Not a bad problem to have.
When everything was said and done, the fact that we won the All A State Tournament was truly surreal to us. Many coaches can coach for years and years and never even get a chance at something like this. We are so thankful to have been apart of this magical experience. We couldn't love our sweet basketball girls any more. They are part of our family.
It never gets old to see our name in the Champion slot. We all rushed home to a celebratory pep rally in Glasgow's gym. It was so awesome for our community to come out and support our team one more time. Now just to come down off this "high" and play a few more ballgames before the regular season tournament time begins. Never a dull moment around here. Way to go Lady Scotties!!
