This year’s Women’s Open Elite was clearly the toughest in NACBAIT history, as there were 6 hard working teams who had a good shot to take it all.  Even the 2 young teams in the division made the more experienced teams work for everything they got, as they each had single digit losses in pool play.  By the time Monday had rolled around, we went from 10 playoff teams to only 4 in a real struggle for supremacy. The first Semifinal game was the undefeated SF ArcAngels (2002 champions) and the LA Aiya (2001, 2003, 2004 Champions).  San Francisco had looked great all tournament long, as they had been an unstoppable scoring machine.  Meanwhile, Aiya was priming themselves for another deep run as they were pacing themselves for a long tournament.  They had suffered a minor setback with a loss to Toronto in Pool Play, but were still feeling great about their chances.  LA began with balanced scoring as 6 players made their mark in the first half.  SG Jessica Liang was absolutely in a zone as she hit 2 threes and sank a couple more that were only a couple inches inside the line.  With ArcAngel speed demon Kathleen Ty (2 points, 3 boards, 4 fouls) in foul trouble, and Kelly Tiao (10 pts, 7 rebs, 2 steals) outnumbered on the boards, this proved to be a difficult matchup for San Fran.  LA continued to stretch the lead, before finally advancing 52-34.  To their credit, the ArcAngels refused to give up, and played hard up to the very last second.  The second game was a rematch of last year’s Championship game, as SF Red Coach (2005 Champs) and Toronto CCYAA A (2006 Champs) met up again. In last year’s game, Red Coach could not find their range against the Toronto defense.  Toronto played their brand of ball again this time, with Cecilia Chan (5 steals), Janice Lui (3 steals) and Christine Vuong (2 steal, 3 assists) ballhawking Red Coach and causing 10 additional turnovers.  On the Toronto offensive end, their steady guard play resulted in only 5 turnovers, so you might think CCYAA would have an easy time once again.  But SF Red Coach came up with a great plan.  The new gameplan was to hit the offensive boards hard.  Red Coach outrebounded Toronto 32-21, with a lot of that boardwork happening on second chance opportunities.  Red Coach held a 6 point halftime lead, and held on for a 3 point win, 35-32. Guard   Angie Wong paced Red Coach with 8 points and 7 rebounds, while Kim Lee had 16 pts, 3 rebounds, and 2 assists for CCYAA.