“I always say this when we play tough ones, but that’s about what we expected,” Champion coach Michael Cole said. “Anyone could’ve won today. They tried to impose their will, we tried to do what we do.

“I thought they did a nice job adjusting to some of the things that we did … We made a couple adjustments here and there and at the end we finally made some free throws which helps.”

Both Champion and Liberty are the No. 1 seeds in the upcoming area Division III sectional-district tournaments, Champion in the Lakeview District and Liberty in the Struthers District.

The Flashes came out hot for the first half of the opening quarter, proving to be a thorn in Liberty’s side. Coming into the game, Cole planned for the opposite to happen.

Staff photo / Brian Yauger Liberty’s Cianna Smith, left, attempts to stop Jenna Deer of Champion.

“I was afraid they were going to be hot,” Cole said. “I wrote on my board ‘weather the early storm.’ I said the same thing last game and they came out and within about a minute and a half, they’re up nine. Then we flipped the script and I was feeling pretty good.

“But they’re a good team, they’re not going to back down and they made their run.”

After trailing by two after the first quarter, the Leopards put together a 21-point second quarter to take the lead, 33-25, at halftime. Shar’da Williamson led the Liberty offense, scoring 23 total points with Nevaeh Dixon adding 16.

Emma Gumont led the Flashes offense with 22 points. Ava Howell (16 points) and Brooke Whitt (12 points) each were large contributors on offense as well. Champion saw the free throw line 34 times, converting on 22 shots from the charity stripe.

The Flashes (18-3, 11-1) have hit some bumps along the way this season, losing important players to injury and graduation. If there’s one thing Cole has over the years, it’s that a ‘next man up’ mentality is crucial for success.

“When I was teaching at Lakeview, I always hung around the football guys,” he said. “If one of their kids gets hurt, it was ‘next man up’, that football mentality. You will never see me complain about losing players … Somebody’s got to fill a role and keep the momentum going.”

That mentality has guided the team through some rough patches and the Golden Flashes still earned the top district seed and won a league title outright.

“We lost Abby White last year to graduation and Allison Smith this year to injury. Not a lot of teams would go 18-3 with our schedule … It’s something that the girls can look back on and we can reflect and say that this was a great season considering the circumstances.”

The Flashes have one last game before the tournament and it’s by far their toughest. On Wednesday, Champion travels to Harding to take on the Raiders, who are the top seed in the Division I Ravenna District.

“They’re very, very good,” Cole said. “I was talking to (Liberty) coach Deidre (Watson) before and Harding has about everything you want. They’ve got the bigs, they’ve got the guards, they play great defense.”

Going into a game against a top Division I school as a Division III school poses its challenges, but Cole just wants his team to go out and do what they do best.

“We wrapped up the league title, so the pressure’s off for us at this point,” he said. “This is a game that we want. We’ve played Harding the last three years, we split with them. I guess it’s gonna be a rubber match, but they are firing on all cylinders right now.

“I’m excited. We’re pumped up, I told them, don’t come in scared. Go attack do what you gotta do. We’re gonna play our brand of basketball. I’m not changing for anyone.”