The Maple Ridge Ramblers have advanced to the semi finals of the B.C. Senior Girls AAA basketball championships.

The Maple Ridge Ramblers found themselves idling in rush-hour traffic Thursday night on centre court at the Langley Events Centre.

It took some clever re-routing to turn the lights from red to green, and once that happened, the Fraser Valley champions were able to ease their foot down on the gas pedal just enough to find themselves clear of North Vancouver’s Handsworth Royals and earn a berth in tonight’s Final Four round here at the B.C. senior girls Triple A basketball championships.

“We tried to spread things out (on offence),” Maple Ridge head coach Don Herman outlined following his team’s 56-52 win over the Royals on centre court in the last of four quarterfinal matchups which have now served to set the final invitees for tonight’s B.C. semifinals.

“They were (playing) triangle-and-two on Kolbie (Orum) and Jane (Grisley), our two bigs, and so the things that we were trying to run against them, it was all so congested. We couldn’t get them the ball, because there was too much help.”

The time-honoured junk defence, consisting a of a three-person triangle zone formation, with two players assigned player-to-player roles around designated offensive players, was working well enough that the Royals had been able to build an early 24-12 lead.

“So we decided to go five out, make them come out and get us a bit, instead of standing around waiting for them,” continued Herman. “We cut, we reversed, and then we got the one-on-one matchups we wanted, if we entered (the ball) right away.”

Deliberate movements, then decisive passes down low, especially to the 6-foot-2 senior Orum, eventually got the desired results.

Orum scored 24 points in addition to pulling down 26 rebounds to lead the Ramblers past the Royals into a Friday re-match of their recent Fraser Valley title game clash, won by the Ramblers, this time with the winner getting a spot in Saturday’s championship game.

“After the first half, I didn’t know how we were going to win,” Herman admitted, “or how we were going to score. But Kolbie got the ball a bit more in the second half.”

Friday night the Ramblers face Brookwood Bobcats. Tip off is at 6:15 p.m.