LA CROSSE — It’s a game that local basketball fans have been waiting for all season, and it officially tips off on Saturday.
Two years ago, the Aquinas High School girls went down to the wire and beat a very young Cuba City team for a WIAA Division 4 sectional championship in Wisconsin Dells.
The Blugolds (23-4) and Cubans (21-5) have since swapped positions — Cuba City with the experience of placing as state runner-up a year ago — and are prepared to revisit the rivalry in the same venue at 1 p.m. Saturday.
On the line, just like two years ago, is a berth in the state tournament.
“I remember a lot of people there,” Aquinas junior Sammy Davis said. “I had my seniors all around me, and I was a little freshman.
“I was nervous, but it got better when I got in the game. It was close the whole time.”
That could happen again, but Blugolds coach Dave Donarski knows his team has to do a lot of things well to make it happen against a loaded team filled with size and very good shooters.
“They’ve got great experience with five seniors who played in a state final last year, so that goes to their advantage,” he said. “Their bigs are good, and we’ll have our hands full with that.
“On top of that, they have three kids who shoot 35 to 45 percent from 3, so we’re going to have to be really good defensively and dialed in.”
Senior Ella Vosberg is a 5-foot-10 player who can get to the basket and averages a team-high 17.3 points and 8 rebounds per game. Six-foot senior Dea Crist averages 10.3 points and 7.9 rebounds as another inside threat for the Cubans.
Vosberg scored 15 points, and Crist had nine points and 13 rebounds in the sectional final two years ago. Davis had 16 points that day. All have done nothing but improve since then.
The Blugolds will have to be multi-dimensional in their offensive attack. That means sophomore Olivia Passehl and senior Emma Dobbins will have to perform on open opportunities just like they did in Thursday’s 53-38 victory over top-seeded Neillsville in Osseo. Passehl made six 3s and Dobbins two to open things up a bit more inside for Davis, who had 20 points and 16 rebounds.
Cuba City has won four straight games — all by at least 28 points — since a 69-54 loss to Prairie du Chien on Feb. 18.
“They are strong, they are big, and they have a lot of girls who can handle the ball,” said Davis, who is averaging 17.1 points and 9.5 rebounds while shooting 58.8 percent from the floor. “They have a lot of girls who can play inside and rebound. I don’t want to say we don’t have that size, but I think we can play with them in there.”
Seniors Emma Dobbins and Kathryn Savoldelli will have to be part of that inside presence, and Savoldelli and point guard Ava Fernholz will have to continue the defensive performances they’ve been turning in during the postseason.
Savoldelli has been exceptional against Bangor’s Anna Fronk (a 17-point scorer held to five) and Neillsville’s Madi Davel and Sydney Subke. Fernholz guarded Subke (a 17-point scorer held to three) as her primary assignment on Thursday.
Assignments against the Cubans — an up-tempo approach — will differ from the more deliberate approach taken by Neillsville.
“I feel like, from what we’ve seen, we have a good understanding of what their kids are good at or not so good at,” Donarski said. “We’ve seen them in many different situations, and we’ll try to simulate what we saw in the times they’ve had the most trouble.”
