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River Ridge primed for next step in playoffs

 
River Ridge’s Leah Ford looks to pass over Fivay’s Alyssa Bennett. Ford is one of seven seniors on the roster.
River Ridge’s Leah Ford looks to pass over Fivay’s Alyssa Bennett. Ford is one of seven seniors on the roster.
Published Jan. 21, 2015

River Ridge High School has easily been one of the top girls basketball teams in Pasco County the past few years. But one foe — and a district one to boot — always seems to trip up the Royal Knights.

Despite going 19-8 last season, River Ridge narrowly missed the playoffs after falling 41-39 in the Class 5A, District 8 semifinals to Land O'Lakes.

It was a difficult pill for the Royal Knights to swallow. And so far this season, the Gators are still a roadblock.

Land O'Lakes, undefeated in the district, has handed River Ridge two of its four losses, beating the Knights 33-31 at the beginning of the 2014-15 campaign and 43-35 last week.

The Gators have won six of the past seven meetings between the rivals dating to 2012.

"It's getting annoying," coach Joeyn Dearsman said. "I believe we are capable of beating Land O'Lakes. A lot of it is mental. The memory of Land O'Lakes beating us last year three times has been a mental block. We just weren't as confident against them as we usually are."

River Ridge is armed with the best and most experienced team it has had since making four consecutive state playoff appearances under Dawn Uekerus in the mid 1990s.

Leah Ford, one of seven seniors on the roster, is averaging a career-high 18.9 points per game, accruing a school-record 1,642 in her four years. At 5 feet 10, she is capable of playing almost any position on the floor and has set personal highs in rebounding (8.3), assists (3.5) and steals (4.0). She dropped a career-high 30 points on Tarpon Springs last month.

"We need to be mentally tough," Ford said. "It has to be more than me. We all have to contribute as our best if we are going win."

The outside shooting of role players Eve Hay and Jaclyn Eden has really opened up the offense for the Royal Knights, who were 19-4 entering the final week of the regular season.

Hay, a senior, is shooting nearly 50 percent from behind the arc with a team-high 48 3-pointers. Eden, a junior, is hovering around 40 percent from 3-point land with 37 made.

The interior play of senior forward Shayla Bell-Francis has been invaluable to the team as well. Bell-Francis is second on the team with 5.1 rebounds per game and third in steals at 2.1. Fellow senior Carly Wallace was also a defensive presence with 2.4 steals per game.

"The experience from our seven seniors helps," Dearsman said. "I don't have to go over the same things I would have to with younger players. All of them have been with me for at least two years."

In her sixth season at the helm, Dearsman is no stranger to success. She took over a program that had gone 4-56 in the three seasons prior to her arrival. She believes strongly in her team, and with a 94-59 career record, the results back her up.

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During her playing career at Ridgewood, Dearsman was a deadly accurate 3-point shooter. Her team qualified for the state playoffs all four years, winning two games in the postseason. River Ridge has yet to win a playoff game in its history, going 0-6.

At Florida Atlantic University, Dearsman was a key player off the bench as the Owls went 12-16 as a member of the Atlantic Sun Conference.

"It was a life-changing experience," Dearsman said. "Coach (Chancellor) Dugan, I still keep in contact with her at least once a month. She knew I wanted to be a coach. At halftime, she would talk to me about adjustments and give me that inside coaching perspective."

Like her coach and father Tim, who played at Western Carolina, Ford hopes to play major college basketball when her high school days are done. But the goal that she is currently focused on is making history with River Ridge. She wants to deliver a district title. She wants to deliver the program's first playoff win.

"If you compare my first year of coaching with this year, it's been totally different," Dearsman said. "These seniors came in right when we had turned things around. Now it's more about basketball IQ."

And this might be the best opportunity to finally nab that first region victory.

"That would be huge," Dearsman said. "It's about confidence and convincing these kids that they can win."