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Girls state basketball tournament roundup: Canyon rubs out 4A titlist

Georgetown no match for powerhouse that’s 15-0 at state since 2000

AUSTIN — Rarely is a defending champion so thoroughly dismantled.

Then again, Canyon has a history of making some of the best girls basketball teams in Texas look out of their league at the state tournament.

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Freshman guard Angel Hayden scored 18 points, including all nine for her team in the third quarter, and Canyon rolled over defending Class 4A champion Georgetown, 41-22, in a state semifinal Thursday night.

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Madison Parker, the only Canyon player left from the school’s 2011 state title team, scored 12 points and grabbed seven rebounds. Canyon (33-4) and coach Joe Lombard advanced to Saturday’s 3 p.m. 4A state final with a chance to win their eighth championship since 2000.

Haley Frias scored eight points for Georgetown (31-7), which went nearly 13 minutes of the first half without a field goal. The meeting was a clash of two of the top coaches in Texas history as Lombard and Georgetown’s Rhonda Farney both have more than 1,000 career victories.

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Lombard has 15 career state titles at Canyon and Nazareth. His Canyon teams are 15-0 at the state tournament since 2000. Their last tournament loss was in the 1999 state final.

Canyon scored 34 points in the paint and rarely had to settle for jump shots.

Waco La Vega 66, Abilene Wylie 53: Erin DeGrate had 24 points and 13 rebounds, and Waco La Vega won a 3A state semifinal to keep alive its bid to become the 19th undefeated champion in state history.

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La Vega (34-0), which finished the regular season ranked No. 1 in the state in 3A, will play second-ranked Argyle in the state championship game at 10 a.m. Saturday. Third-ranked Abilene Wylie finished 30-6 after committing 17 turnovers and shooting 34 percent from the field.

Calveion Landrum scored 19 points for La Vega. She had 10 in the first quarter as the Pirates raced to a 13-2 lead. La Vega shot 52 percent in building a 38-16 lead by halftime.

Kerens 56, Weimar 36: Senior guard Taylor Ames scored five of her game-high 21 points early in the third quarter as Kerens grabbed a 28-14 lead and won a Class A Division I semifinal.

Plains 56, Santo 39: Riley Earnest had 26 points and nine rebounds for Plains in a Class A Division I semifinal. Earnest was 10-for-10 from the free throw line.