OREM -    No matter what Union High's girls basketball team did during the opening half of its 3A semifinal showdown against underdog Juab, the Wasps refused to fold.

Gutsy and determined until the very end, Juab kept fighting and fighting after Union raced out to an early double-digit lead. Trailing by nine points at the start of the fourth quarter, the Wasps came flying at Union and positioned themselves to potentially pull off what would have been an epic upset.

But Union did just enough to make sure that didn't happen.

After seeing Juab battle all the way back to tie the game at 39-39 with 2:10 remaining, Union made just enough plays at both ends of the court to survive and win, 45-41, on Friday at the UVU Events Center.

"I thought Juab fought very hard," said Union coach Keith Morris. "I felt like Juab forced us to struggle. I give them a tremendous amount of credit for fighting back and making that a good, close game like it was. I suppose (that's) the kind of game you want to see, you want to have in a state semifinal.

"I feel very fortunate that we were able to hang in and hold on there at the end."

Junior guard Katie Richens  made two huge free throws and scored 12 points to lead Union, Sarah John had 10 and Meadow Simkins and Brianna Nielsen each added 7.

Union's girls basketball team will make its first appearance in the state championship game since 2003 when it meets Richfield to decide the 3A title at 1:30 this afternoon at UVU.

Getting there is the culmination of four years of hard work inside Union's program. John, Nielsen, Majen Mansfield and Alexis Bensen have been in Union's program for four years, Richens for three years and Simkins for one. Together, they've helped propel Union to tremendous heights this winter.

Of course, it was incredibly difficult to ultimately overcome Juab on Friday and make that a reality.

Union led 13-3 just six minutes into Friday's semifinal and maintained a double-digit lead all the way through to the end of the third quarter.

But with Tessa Bradford and Kiz Farrer leading the way, Juab kept fighting, and the Wasps went on a 10-1 run to start the fourth quarter to eventually knot the game up at 39-39 with just over two minutes to go.

With her team's season on the line, though, Richens came through in the clutch. Sent to the free throw for a 1-and-1 just 52 seconds after she had missed the front end of a 1-and-1, Richens buried two free throws to put her team back on top with 1:29 remaining.

Union got stops all the way up until Bradford made a pair of consolation free throws with 4.1 seconds to go and wound up making 6 of its final 8 free throws at the other end to survive.

"It did get pretty rough," said Richens. "We didn't have as much team play this game. That kind of hurt us, but we were able to pull together again. We have great girls that never give up, and everybody just had to pick each other up."

In the end, that was enough for Union, which ended Juab's fantastic tournament run. Against the Cougars, Bradford led Juab with 21 points and Farrer added 11