AURORA | A capsule preview of the 2025 Class 6A girls basketball state tournament Great 8 contest between Denver East and Grandview scheduled for March 8, 2025:
Courtney Oakes is Aurora Sentinel Sports Editor. Reach him at sports@aurorasentinel.com. Twitter/X: @aurorasports. IG: Sentinel Prep Sports
2025 CLASS 6A GREAT 8 GIRLS BASKETBALL STATE PLAYOFF GAME
No. 8 Denver East (17-8) vs. No. 1 Grandview (22-3)
March 8, 4 p.m. at Denver Coliseum
BREAKDOWN: Denver East and Grandview meet in the postseason for the first time and haven’t met on the court since the opening game of the 2013-14 regular season, when the Wolves earned a 78-34 victory and also took a one-point decision in the season-opener the previous season. The Angels won a 52-36 decision during a meeting at the Heritage Holiday Hoopla tournament in the 2009-10 regular season. …Between them, the programs have five all-time state championships to their credit and four of those belong to Grandview, which won back-to-back then-Class 5A state titles in 2017 and 2018 and again took consecutive crowns in 2022 and 2023, while Denver East won its lone state championship in the 2009-10 season.
DENVER EAST: The Angels have made four straight postseason appearances since missing out in the COVID-19-altered 2021-21 season and have made it further in the playoffs since the 2009-10 season in which they won the then-Class 5A state championship. Coach Carl Mattei — who is very familiar with Grandview as the former coach at Regis Jesuit High School — has led Denver East to the playoffs in all three of his seasons on the bench and it has picked up two postseason wins this season with a 54-49 overtime outlasting of No. 25 Eaglecrest in the 1st round (as junior Mairead Hearty had a double-double with 16 points and 11 rebounds, while junior Liana Valdez nearly matched that with 14 points and nine boards) followed by a 55-46 win over No. 15 Arvada West in the Sweet 16. …For the season, Denver East is led by senior Evelina Otto — a foreign exchange student who recently committed to the University of Utah — with averages of 16.5 points and 11.8 rebounds per game, plus 2.5 blocked shots per contest. The Angels have two other players who averaged in double figures in scoring in sophomore Grace Hall (12.1 ppg plus team-high averages in assists (4.2) and steal (4.0) per game) and junior Mairead Hearty (10.0 points, 10.4 rebounds per game).
GRANDVIEW: The Wolves have qualified for the postseason for at least 23 consecutive seasons and now have been to at least the Sweet 16 round in 14 straight campaigns. Coach Josh Ulitzky’s Grandview team is in the Great 8 for the ninth time in the past 10 seasons after it got knocked out in the Sweet 16 last season by Mullen. The Wolves earned a 72-30 victory over No. 33 Horizon in the first round and followed that with a 56-43 win over No. 16 Rocky Mountain in the Sweet 16. Senior star Sienna Betts has scored 24 points in each postseason game, while sophomore Ava Chang has averaged 21 points in those two contests and senior Deija Roberson has a combined 17 points, while senior Leaiva Holliman is the only other Grandview player to score in both playoff games. …For the season, Betts — the two-time defending Colorado Gatorade Player of the Year, a McDonald’s All-American and UCLA signee — ranks fourth in Class 6A in scoring average at 23.8 points per game, while she leads the classification by a wide margin with an average of 17.0 rebounds per game (and is the state’s all-time career rebounding leader, boys or girls, according to Colorado High School Activities Association records) and ranks fourth in the classification in averages of assists (5.1) and blocked shots (3.3). Chang gives Grandview its second double-digit scorer as she has averaged 15 points per game (plus 4.3 apg), while Roberson is next at 8.8 points per contest.
WINNER GETS: The Denver East-Grandview winner advances to the March 13 semifinals where it will face the winner of the Great 8 game between No. 4 Cherry Creek and No. 5 Pine Creek.
