On Tuesday, Feb. 22, a 10-year drought came to an end. The Pleasant Valley girls basketball team defeated Cedar Rapids Washington 71-66 to book their trip to the state tournament.
The Spartans clinched the MAC as outright champions with three games to spare. Coming into the game, the Spartans had a record of 20 wins and only two losses. Riding on an 11-game win streak, the Spartans were ready for the ultimate challenge.
Pleasant Valley’s leading scorer, junior Halle Vice, knew her team would get the job done on the court. “The team was not nervous one bit. We had lots of confidence in each other and we knew we could count on each other to leave it all on the floor,” she said. “It was a really exciting moment because we had been working to reach this point all year and it finally paid off.” Vice finished with 30 points to help push the Spartans past Cedar Rapids Washington.
Excitement was high the whole night as the Spartans knew they had just made history. Senior Natalie Carslake discussed the energy on the team after clinching a trip to the State Tournament. “Once we won, the whole team was beyond excited. Coach Goetz gave us a day to really take in the win and reflect on everything we had accomplished that year,” she said. “That was our first big moment of making history as a team. We knew we weren’t done yet though, we had 24 hours to experience the pure joy of winning the regional final and then we were back to being focused on state and continuing to make more history.”
The regional final win helped the girls basketball program snap a 10-year drought of coming up short to the state tournament. At state, they received the fourth top seed and played a Iowa City High team with 18 wins on the year. Pleasant Valley went on to win the game 52-47 and advance to the semifinals. The Spartans historic run came to an end as they were defeated by the soon to be state champions, Johnston.
After a season of great success, the future is bright for younger generations in the girls basketball program. The bar has now been raised as the Spartans started off the season with high standards and they met them all as they made a deep postseason run into the state tournament.
