BRANDON, SD – The top-seeded Brandon Valley Lynx girls basketball team showed why they finished the regular season unbeaten, downing the 16th seeded Sturgis Scoopers 52-24 on Friday night, punching their ticket to the state AA basketball tournament.
The Lynx dismantled teams all season long by using full and half court trapping defenses, forcing turnovers that Brandon Valley’s defenders would turn into easy points.
The Scooper girls came out with high intensity and energy early had no problems breaking Brandon Valley’s press, trailing the Lynx 13-8 headed into the second quarter.
The Sturgis girls struggled to put the ball in the hoop throughout the second quarter, only managing two field goals. Brandon Valley outscored the Scoopers 15-4 in the second and led 28-12 at intermission.
The defensive pressure began to cause problems for the Scoopers early in the second half, as the Lynx converted steals into points, extending their lead to 45-20 headed in the fourth quarter.
The Lynx lead grew to 30 points midway through the final quarter, causing a running time clock. Both coaches brought in reserves to play out the last few minutes and Brandon Valley cruised to the 28-point victory.
“As we were going through the handshake like at the end of the game, their head coach (Mike Zerr) stopped me and said ‘you’re not a #16 team’”, said Scooper head coach Courtney Pool. “(Zerr) said that they haven’t seen a team come up with a game plan like that against them all year long. Our girls competed hard and the score does not reflect how competitive that game was for a very long time.”
The Scooper defense held Lynx standout guard Alyvia Padgett to just 15 points for the game, 11 points under her season scoring average. Gracie Salter led Brandon Valley with 16 points and 16 rebounds. The Lynx shot 26% from the field (16-of-61), 51% from the stripe (15-of-29), grabbed 35 rebounds and had 15 turnovers.
Sturgis wrapped up their season with a 7-14 record and were led by Leigha Long with nine points. The Scoopers made 9-of-42 shots (21%), 6-of-14 free throws (42%), had 20 rebounds and committed 22 turnovers.
#1 Brandon Valley will face #8 Tea Area in the first round of the girls State AA basketball tournament on Thursday, Mar. 12 at the Summit Arena in Rapid City.
