Josh Auger is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Corona del Sol High School for AZPreps365.com.

After Corona del Sol knocked off host Mountain Ridge in a play-in game, the Aztecs are advancing to the 6A playoff bracket.

Despite 10 days off for the Aztecs, they showed a ton of intensity on both sides of the ball that sparked a timeout by Mountain Ridge just 90 seconds into the game after Corona took a 7-0 lead. The game completely shifted after this timeout, Mountain Ridge went on a 16-0 run over the next five minutes to gain a 16-7 advantage before Corona used a timeout of their own.

Mountain Ridge took an 18-7 lead at the end of the first frame, holding Corona scoreless for the final 6:30 with an aggressive defensive attack. Corona coach Neil MacDonald later attributed the slow start to poor execution offensively, pointing to not setting screens and cutting up to their standards.

The Aztecs made the necessary adjustments in the second quarter as they continued the game's wild trend of runs scoring 12 in a row to take the lead. Junior DeShaun Johnson had some aggressive attacks to the rim leading to some timely baskets in Corona’s second quarter comeback. Finally, some buckets were traded back and forth leading to a tie game 23-23 at halftime.

“When we brought up the intensity and energy on defense, it allowed us to start converting on offense,” Johnson said of the team's adjustments following a lackluster start. 

Corona came in as the No. 15 seed in the bracket with Mountain Ridge the No. 30 seed and the second half opened up playing in Corona’s favor.

The Aztecs had a big size advantage especially with senior Bo Dolinsek manning the paint on both ends. Offensively Dolinsek was able to get consistently good post-up opportunities leading to easy back downs and buckets. Defensively Corona had success when they ran Mountain Ridge off the three-point line and forced them to score from the paint. The Aztecs brought it on both sides of the ball in the third quarter leading to winning the frame 14-6 as well as taking a 37-29 lead into the fourth quarter.

“We knew they couldn’t guard us in the paint, we watched film on them all week,” Dolinsek said. The tide of this game completely shifted when Corona was able to exploit their matchups using their size advantage leading to a dominant second half. “Using our size was the message all week, it just took us until the third quarter to execute it,” said MacDonald.

The fourth quarter was closing time for the Aztecs as they were firing on all cylinders to close the game out against a struggling Mountain Ridge team. Jayson Covington threw down a big fast break dunk in the first minute of the quarter which had the Corona student section jumping and the Aztec players fired up. Johnson and Dolinsek continued to score bucket after bucket to expand this lead and put the game away with a final score of 70-51.

“It felt like we were practicing for a month, we were just tired of playing against each other,” Dolinsek said of the 10 days separating games. “The break kind of made it seem like it was the offseason,” Johnson added. After being in such a rhythm with multiple games a week for two plus months the Aztecs felt like their extended period of time in between games played a role in their slow start.

“Don’t like them kid you this was a playoff game,” MacDonald said. Winning this game means that Corona moves into the 6A bracket as the No. 11 seed, where the Aztecs will face off against Pinnacle Pioneers on Wednesday night. The game is at Pinnacle at 7 p.m.