Kiyleyah Parr, La Vega claim back-to-back Texas (UIL) high school state girls basketball titles
SAN ANTONIO, Texas - Kiyleyah Parr put an exclamation point on her career by leading Waco La Vega to a second straight title on Saturday.
The Wichita State signee helped the Pirates pick up a 45-36 win over Canyon at The Alamodome and she had key plays late in the fourth that decided the Texas (UIL) Class 4A championship.
Canyon was challenging for its first lead of the game in the final quarter.
Jaylee Moss hit a pair of free throws with 7:45 to play to trim the La Vega lead to 33-32.
After La Vega missed a shot, the Eagles (30-7) had a chance to take the lead but missed a shot.
On the other end, Parr hit a pull-up jumper to extend the lead for the Pirates (32-11) with less than 7 minutes to play. Then, on the next possession, she got a steal and layup and in a matter of 19 seconds, a 1-point lead turned into a 6-point advantage.
Canyon, La Vega battle for a rebound in the Texas (UIL) Class 4A state championship in San Antonio.
Photo by Tommy Hays, SBLive Sports
After a prolonged scoring drought by both teams, Parr scored again on another Canyon turnover to push the lead to 40-32 with 4:20 left to play.
That all but locked up the title.
“KP is the best point in the state and arguably one of the best in the country,” La Vega coach Marcus Willis said. “She knows how to rise up to the occasion and step up to the challenge.”
Parr had a game-high 21 points while adding four assists and eight steals. She was named the MVP of the game for the second year in a row.
“She knows how to make plays,” Canyon coach Tate Lombard said. “Those situations were huge plays. As hard as it is to score against them, you don’t want to give them easy stuff. She came up with two clutch plays in the fourth quarter and it’s unfortunate.”
Parr toted both the state championship trophy and the MVP award into the postgame press conference.
She said she was playing with a little bit of extra motivation in the game. Her mom texted her a photo of her and her late grandfather on Saturday morning and Saturday would’ve been her grandfather’s birthday.
“I told Coach Marcus before the game, it is my grandpa’s birthday, I gotta go out with a bang.”
Her standout performance came with some of the other standout guards in Waco La Vega's history in attendance.
The 2013-14 3A championship-winning team was honored at halftime of the game for winning the title 10 years ago. On the floor was former coach Amy Gillum, who now coaches Mansfield Summit. Gillum was a guard on the 1994 runner-up team for La Vega.
Also in attendance for the game was former Baylor guard Calveion “Juicy” Landrum — another La Vega standout.
The Pirates closed the season winning 10 games in a row.
Willis said his team’s preparation in the early portion of the season paid dividends, even if the record didn’t reflect it in terms of wins. Among La Vega’s losses were to an Amarillo team that won 35 games; twice Duncanville, a finalist in 6A; to San Antonio Clark, last year’s 6A champions; Mansfield Timberview, the Class 5A runner-up; South Grand Prairie, the other Class 6A finalist; a Hebron squad that won 34 games and to a 31-win Southlake Carroll team.
The other three losses were by forfeits.
“We have a 4A schedule no one would touch,” Willis said. “They are resilient; they were battle-tested from start to finish. They deserve everything they are getting.”
La Vega is the first repeat champion in 4A since Argyle won four in a row — 2016 to 2019 — which started incidentally with a win against La Vega.
Canyon saw its 15-game winning streak and they were unable to recover from the 12-2 deficit in the first quarter. They spent the entire game playing catchup.
Throughout many portions of Saturday’s game, La Vega would pull the ball out and just run the clock — oftentimes forcing Canyon into a position to either chase around its guards or just let time tick off the clock.
Another key facet was the play of Sydney McKinney for La Vega. The senior was tasked with guarding Moss, who drained 7 3-pointers in the semifinal win against Boerne. Moss had only one in this game and the Eagles were 3-for-14 from the 3-point line in the loss.
Moss had a team-high 12 points in the loss, while Sydnee Winfrey and Kambrie Graser had 10 each.
“I’m proud of how our kid battled the defending champions,” Lombard said. “To show resolved after we got off to a bad start and they had a great start. To make a comeback and give yourself a chance in the second half shows the fight our kids have. They didn’t go down without a fight.”
-- Cody Thorn | @sblivetx
