Asked about his team's palpable sense of urgency headed into tonight's Class LL state tournament semifinal game, Norwich Free Academy girls' basketball coach Bill Scarlata admits he might have had something to do with it.

"I told them, 'If you've got a good team, you've got to take advantage of it,'" Scarlata said. "'You don't always get the draw. You don't always get the luck. This may be your only chance, even if you're just a sophomore.'"

And so fourth-seeded NFA's chance to reach the ultimate goal, playing in the championship game at 10,000-seat Mohegan Sun Arena this weekend, comes tonight against a familiar opponent in No. 1 South Windsor. The semifinal game will be held at 7 tonight at Glastonbury High, with the winner facing either No. 2 Wilton or No. 3 Mercy in the final.

South Windsor (26-1) accounted for NFA's only loss this season on Dec. 27, beating the Wildcats (25-1) 48-42 in the final of the South Windsor Holiday Tournament.

South Windsor's only loss then came to Farmington 61-52 in the Central Connecticut Conference championship game on Feb. 25.

"We see the Sun," NFA sophomore Hailey Conley said after the Wildcats' 56-34 quarterfinal victory over Fairfield Warde last week. "We really want to go. It took a lot of hard work this season, but we'll do whatever it takes to get to the Sun."

Beating South Windsor will take good defense, for one. Scarlata said the Bobcats aren't afraid to play with four or five guards. He watched the film of South Windsor's 80-63 victory over Weaver in January on CPTV Sports and saw the Bobcats jack up what he counted as 16 3-pointers in the first half.

And in South Windsor's win over NFA this year, Scarlata's team led 35-31 headed into the fourth quarter, only to have South Windsor come from behind for the victory.

South Windsor's Amy McConnell, who will play next season at Bentley, finished with 21 points in that game, earning the tournament's Most Valuable Player honors. Alex Goslin had 10 points and four steals.

NFA, with a size advantage, got 16 points from senior center Olivia Lane and 12 from junior Cebria Outlow, but only one basket each from guards Conley, Mackenzie Burke and senior Maya Bell.

Conley finished with 25 points, including five 3-pointers, in NFA's victory over Fairfield Warde. The same night, South Windsor edged No. 8 Greenwich 69-66, scoring the final six points on free throws after trailing 64-63 with less than a minute remaining. McConnell, who missed last season with an ACL tear, finished with 22 points, going 8-for-10 from the foul line.

South Windsor, coached by Don Leclerc, reached the Class LL final last year for the first time since 1978, but fell 68-53 to Lauralton Hall.

NFA is attempting to capture its eighth state championship under Scarlata, last winning in 2010.

"We played them so early. It was the fifth game of the year or the sixth game of the year. So we're playing the same team but a different version," Scarlata said of South Windsor. "We've got to keep the score low, have to hold 'em down and hope (we) score enough."

NFA lost in the second round of last year's Class LL tournament to E.O. Smith 55-51 in overtime.

Asked whether he thought this year's team had an opportunity to get this far, one game away from the coveted trip to Mohegan Sun, Scarlata said: "I thought they had the possibility if they developed defensively a little bit.

"Defensively, I think we're a lot better."

v.fulkerson@theday.com

Twitter: @vickieattheday