MARKS — Down 38-33 with less than 13 seconds of play, the Trinity varsity girls attempted to strike fast in hopes of quickly making it a one-possession game.

It wasn’t fast enough, as the Lady Saints took until the three-second mark before Brandis White attempted to hit a 3-pointer. The shot missed, and rolled out of bounds as it bounced off of a Trinity player’s extended hand.

As the buzzer indicating the end of the game sounded, it only took a few seconds for reality to hit the Trinity players: The MAIS Class A championship game against Delta Academy was over. The Lady Saints had come up short.

For Trinity head coach Richy Spears, the ability to put his feelings in words came slowly in the minutes immediately following the game.

“Dejected, mad… I don’t know,” Spears said. “That’s about all I can say.

“I felt like we played hard, like we did all week, and we gave everything we had. We just came up on the short end of the stick, I guess.”

The Lady Saints were down 27-23 going into the fourth, but Madelyn Cross cut the lead to two by sinking two free throw shots. Delta Academy’s Katherine Corbin responded by hitting a foul shot of her own, but White followed up for Trinity with a layup to make the score 28-27 Delta Academy with 5:48 left.

Turnovers plagued the Lady Saints for the next two minutes, as the Lady Raiders hit a layup and sank two free throws to give themselves a five-point lead at the 3:05 mark. White finally broke through with 2:40 left and sank a layup, and the Lady Saints’ Bethany Ogden added a point off a free throw, making it a 32-30 game in favor of Delta Academy.

The Lady Raiders’ Morgan Shook banked a layup with 1:23 seconds left to give Delta Academy more breathing room, but White sank a big 3-pointer at the 1:04 mark to cut Delta Academy’s lead to one for the second time in the fourth.

It would be Trinity’s last basket, however. Shook made a layup with 30 seconds left, and White was unable to sink another 3-pointer when she tried at the 15-second mark. The Lady Saints fouled immediately on the ensuing Delta Academy possession, and Mary Ann Schiele sank both free throws to make Delta’s lead 38-33.

“This is tough,” Spears said. “As much as we poured into (this season), as hard as they worked every day, I just feel terrible for my players.”

Foul shot opportunities heavily favored Delta Academy. Although both teams hit roughly 80 percent of their free throws, Delta Academy was 19-for-22, while Trinity was only 10-for-12.

“They just knocked down their free throws,” Spears said. “They got their chances and took advantage of them, and we didn’t get enough chances to take advantage of.”

Even in defeat, Spears said he was proud of what his players accomplished this season.

“I can’t fault how they played. They were hustling and trying as hard as they could. We’ve played four days in a row, while Delta got an off day Thursday, so you could tell we were tired. The fact that we were able to play as well as we did says a lot.

“I’ve never been disappointed in our hustle at any point I’ve been at Trinity. The hustle has always been there, and that’s what we preach, that we’re going to get after it. I thought we got after it today, but I guess it just wasn’t meant to be.”

White finished with 12 points. Cross had nine points and Ogden added six. All three were named to the All-Tournament Team.

Trinity finished the season 24-10. It will be the Class A No. 2 seed in the overall tournament between Classes A through AAA.