Junior High Girls Compete in NWKL Tournament
8th Grade Places 5th; 7th Grade Places 7th
The junior high girls basketball teams will be competing in the Northwest Kansas League Junior High Basketball Tournament on Monday, February 18th, and Thursday, February 21st. The first round of the tournament will be played at the sites of the top four seeded teams. Teams were seeded on February 15th. The St. Francis seventh grade team will play Quinter at Quinter on Monday at 3:30 PM. The 8th grade team will play in Colby at 4:00 PM.
Brackets are played all the way out so each team will play 3 games in the tournament. Brackets are set up so that teams seeded 1 & 8 and 4 & 5 are on the top bracket and teams 2 & 7 and 3 & 6 are on the bottom side of the bracket. Seeding for the seventh grade teams is as follows: 1) Colby, 2) Quinter, 3) Hoxie, 4) Oberlin, 5) Oakley, 6) Goodland, 7) St. Francis, and 8) Rawlins County.
Seeding for the eighth grade teams is as follows: 1) Hoxie 7-1, 2) Rawlins County 6-2, 3) Colby 7-3, 4) Oakley 5-3, 5) Oberlin 4-4, 6) St. Francis 2-5, 7) Quinter 1-6, and 8) Goodland 1-10.
The final rounds of the tournament will be played at two sites. The seventh grade games on Thursday will be played in Colby beginning at 3:00 PM. The eighth grade games will be played in St. Francis beginning at 2:00 PM.
Update - Tuesday, February 19th: The 7th grade team lost to Quinter by a score of 6-25 on Monday afternoon. They will now play the loser of the the Hoxie/Goodland game at 3:00 PM at Colby High School on Thursday, February 15th.
The 8th grade team also lost on Monday to Colby 28-39. They will now play Quinter at 3:15 PM in the Elementary Gym in St. Francis on Thursday, February 15th. Comments from Coach Morrow follow.
B Team: Junior High Girls Basketball
Loss to Quinter: 6-25
First Round of NWKL Tournament
2/18/08
"Again, the press and the ball pressure brought by Quinter gave us a lot trouble throughout the game, especially in the first half. Handling the ball has been difficult for us all season, and we’re going to have to improve before next year to be competitive with the rest of the teams in the league. In the second half, our defense was able to hold Quinter to a 4-point 3rd quarter and a scoreless 4th quarter."
Scoring: Laura Brunk, 4; Krissy Harris, 2.
A Team: Junior High Girls Basketball
Loss to Colby: 28-39
First Round of NWKL Tournament
2/18/08
"This was a frustrating game for many reasons. Colby has improved since the first time we played them, but our inability to match the intensity of the Eagles was much more of a factor in the outcome of the game. We simply did not play tough enough to win the game. Towards the end of the game, we still had a manageable deficit to overcome, but Colby scored a couple of easy buckets to put the game out of reach."
Scoring: Kaitlyn Figgins, 14; Lexi Hilt, 6; Trista Orth, 4; Jenna Hill, 2; Ashlynn Lambert, 2.
Update - Thursday, February 21st: The St. Francis teams both played well today in the final rounds of the junior high tournament. The 7th grade played well but lost to Goodland in the semifinals by a score of 23-35. They defeated Rawlins County in the 7th place game 27-18 in overtime. The 8th grade girls won the consolation championship by defeating both of their opponents. St. Francis defeated Quinter 29-20 in semifinal action and later beat Oberlin 39-24 to earn 5th place in the tournament. Good job girls! Comments from Coach Morrow follow.
7th Grade Girls Basketball
Round 2 of Tournament: Loss to Goodland: 23-35
2/21/08
"This was a more competitive game than the first game against Goodland. At times, we played very well defensively, and we rebounded better than we have for most of the season. Again, our problem came down to having more even scoring from all of our players. Clarice Neitzel had a career night of scoring with 16 points."
Scoring: Clarice Neitzel, 16; Laura Brunk, 6; Katie Lambert, 1.
Score by quarters:
Sainty: 6 15 20 23
Goodland: 8 21 27 35
7th Grade Girls Basketball
Round 2 of Tournament: Win over Rawlins County
27-18 (Overtime)
2/21/08
"This was a good way for these ladies to end their season. In most aspects of the game, we performed better in the Atwood game than we have all season. We rebounded well and got some easy points because of our offensive rebounding. Jandy Dunn made several key baskets off of the put-back. We played very good defense throughout most of the game and even held Atwood scoreless in both the second quarter and in overtime. In the overtime period, Dunn, Laura Brunk, and Clarice Neitzel all stepped up and scored to close out the win. The girls showed some toughness to win this overtime game."
Scoring: Jandy Dunn, 11; Clarice Neitzel, 8; Katie Lambert, 4; Laura Brunk, 4.
Score by quarters:
Overtime
Sainty: 5 7 13 18 27
Rawlins County: 4 4 8 18 18
8th Grade Girls Basketball
Round 2 of Tournament: Win over Quinter: 29-20
2/21/08
"The second round of the tournament was really a good day for this team. All year we have struggled with starting slowly and paying the price by losing close games. On Thursday, however, we seemed to have a basketball epiphany and kind of figure things out. Kids who had struggled at times in certain aspects of the game had their best efforts in these tournament games. Though our shooting was a little cold in the Quinter game, we were able to make up for it by dominating the Bulldogs in rebounding. Quinter got very few second shots, and in the fourth quarter, Kaitlyn Figgins got some easy put-backs from good a good offensive rebounding effort. We did a good job of pressuring the ball and creating turnovers with a man-to-man defense. Late in the game, Jenna Hill and the rest of our guards did a good job managing the clock and putting the game out of reach for Quinter."
Scoring: Kaitlyn Figgins, 17; Jenna Hill, 8; Lexi Hilt, 4.
Score by quarters:
Sainty: 8 12 19 29
Quinter: 4 12 14 20
8th Grade Girls Basketball
Round 2 of Tournament: Win over Oberlin: 39-24
2/21/08
"The Oberlin game was really our best performance of the year. It was the only game of the season in which the outcome of the game was determined before the fourth quarter, which is very unusual in junior high basketball. Oberlin has a very good team, and they had beaten us just a couple of weeks prior to the tournament by 4 points .
What made the difference on Thursday night was the tremendous
team effort in all aspects of the game given by the ladies. Every
player seemingly had a career night in various ways. Ashlynn
Lambert thoroughly frustrated Oberlin’s point guard and stole the
ball a number of times from her, which didn’t allow the Red Devils
to get into their offense very easily. Trista Orth played great
defense against one of Oberlin’s post players, keeping her off the
glass and forcing her take contested shots all night. Early in the
second quarter, Jenna Hill hit two key three-pointers that seemed
to change the tone of the game. After that, Kaitlyn Figgins took
over the game and provided a lesson on how to score from the post
area. Her 21-point night was one of the most dominating scoring
performances I’ve seen in a long time in junior high
basketball.
The Oberlin game was very exciting from a coach’s perspective. The
kids did what they’ve been coached to do, played with confidence,
and realized their potential as a team."
Scoring: Kaitlyn Figgins, 21; Jenna Hill, 10; Lexi Hilt, 4; Jacquelyn Ketzner, 2.
Score by quarters:
Sainty: 4 16 33 39
Oberlin: 4 10 14 24
Click here to view the completed 7th grade bracket
Click here to view the completed 8th grade bracket
