They left it till the bitter end, but the Belmont Bulldogs sent their fans happily into the wet evening as the host team and No. 5 seed silenced the Spectrum Thunder 49-47 in the new Belmont gymnasium in Langford on Thursday night.
Jess Thomson snuck in the winning basket with five seconds left on the clock, recording the last two of her 22 points on the night as the powerful post player led the Bulldogs to victory.
Danayit Woldu had 23 for the Thunder, including a pair of key three-pointers in the fourth quarter. Her last attempt from well out and off balance was off target with 1.4 seconds left in the senior girls’ Lower Island triple-A basketball championship playoff matchup.
The Bulldogs advance to face the No. 1 Oak Bay Breakers today at 5:45 p.m., which will be a tall order.
“We had a tight game against them last time, too,” Bulldogs coach Brad Lidstone said of the clash with the Thunder. “It was a three-point game last time, so we expected this. They’re a talented team, well coached and we expect good games from them every time we play them.”
Thomson was clutch down the stretch as she made the Thunder pay inside.
“She’s a tough kid — Grade 12. She’s put a lot of time into our program, put the work in and she showed the results of her hard work tonight. She played very well,” Lidstone said of Thomson, who also tied it up at 47-47.
“We lost track of her at times, especially at the end of the game,” Thunder coach Gary Baker said of defending Thomson. “We had talked about it a number of times. We just weren’t focused and lost track of her.”
The No. 4 Thunder fell behind 8-2 early but managed to cut it to 13-9 after the first quarter. Spectrum managed to grab its first lead right at the midway mark of the second at 20-19, but fell behind 27-23 at halftime. The two teams went back and forth from that point on as the Bulldogs led 37-35 after three quarters.
Down 43-39, Woldu nailed down back-to-back three-pointers to tie it at 45-45 and then she drove the lane to go up 47-45.
“She’s been a good guard for us this year. She stepped up quite well and led the team. She’s performed well and if everyone else had stepped up like she did, we would have been alright tonight,” Baker said of Woldu.
In the late game, No. 3 Mount Douglas defeated Stelly’s 54-36 and advanced to face the No. 2 Claremont Spartans tonight at 7:15 p.m.
The top four teams at the tournament at Belmont will advance to the Island championship at Claremont beginning next Thursday. Oak Bay and Claremont are favoured to get through to Saturday’s 6 p.m. final.
“It moves us a step closer,” Lidstone said of Belmont’s chances of grabbing one of four spots. “Our success will be based on how we do on Saturday. That will be a big day for us. Hopefully we can ride this momentum into Saturday.
“We’re going to work hard,” he said of today’s matchup against the Breakers, who are ranked No. 7 in B.C. “Oak Bay is a talented team. We’re just going to play our game and concentrate on what we can do.”
The fifth-place finisher at this city championship can challenge the North’s No. 4 for entrance into Islands.
Meanwhile, at the double-A championship at Lambrick Park, Pacific Christian, Parkland, St. Michaels University School and Brentwood all advanced to semifinals tonight. Brentwood faces SMUS at 5:30 p.m., while Parkland tackles a strong PCS team at 7:15 p.m.
