Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First

Kimball girls take fourth place at SPVA tournament

After winning 49-31 over Maxwell in first round play of the SPVA tournament as reported last week, the Kimball High girls suffered two defeats in play at the North Platte Community College, and ended up 4th in the 8 school bracket.

The number two seeded Lady Longhorns lost to number three seed Chase County, a team they had defeated on the road just a couple of weeks back, 42-35, on Friday night with the ladies from Imperial winning out 52-41 to advance them into the championship game, while Kimball dropped down in the losers bracket to battle Sutherland for consolation honors where they suffered yet another loss on Saturday afternoon 43-35. North Platte St. Pats, the number one seed, won it all defeating Chase County 68-46 in the title game.

Coach Chauncey Pedersen probably felt he was having his worst nightmare in the contest with Chase County as the Lady Horns couldn't throw the ball in a horse tank. They fell behind 8-2 in the first quarter going 0 for 3 from the field with Jessica Hanks scoring on a pair of free throws. At half time they were down 20-10 and had shot a miserable 3 of 30 from the field. Things got better for Kimball in the third period as they held their own with both clubs scoring 11 and they closed the margin to within 7 points twice. Despite a 10 point fourth quarter by Hanks who hit a pair of treys, the Horns had dug the hole too deep to escape from and thus the loss.

A good effort by Hanks who finished with 16 points on 5/12 shooting from the field going 2/5 on 3 pointers and 4/4 at the foul line. She was also top rebounder with 9. Danika Daum was off the mark in this contest and wound up with 8 points, well below her team leading 19 point average. She had 7 rebounds and 2 steals. Madison Biesecker had 8 points, 7 rebounds and 2 assists. Alex Reader 6 points, 4 rebounds, 3 steals and 2 assists. Arica McCloud 2 points and 8 rebounds, and Kailey Dickerson 1 point.

In team stats Kimball shot well at the line going 16/20, but was 11/62 from the field for 17%, 3/28 on 3 point attempts for 10.7%, and along with struggling with their shooting, they ended up with 25 turnovers. Rebounding was close with Kimball charted with 37 and Chase County 40. Kimball with 8 steals and 6 assists, 15 fouls compared to Chase County with 17. The Imperial girls shot 13/20 at the line, 18/66 from the field for 27% overall and 3/12 on 3 pointers for 25%.

Chase County was led in scoring by point guard Destiny Reinke, a 5'0" sophomore with 15 points including 3 treys and what is ironic, she failed to score in the last meeting between these two teams. MaKenna Ketter had 13, Taylin McNair 10, and Paige Spady 9.

Score by quarter

Kimball 2 8 11 20 - 41

Chase County 8 12 11 21 - 52

Danika Daum was back on track Saturday and in fact was dauminating in the first half as she scored the first 6 points to get Kimball off to a good start and at the quarter break it was Daum 15 and Sutherland 11! The tall and talented junior kept it going in the second period as she scored Kimball's first 18 points with Alex Reader converting a 3 point play with 1:20 left in the half and Kimball led 21-20 at intermission. The Lady Horns were up 30-26 after the third quarter, but after Madison Biesecker hit a trey to open play, things went sour for the Lady Horns as they were outscored 17 to 5 in the final quarter.

Daum ended up with 22 points and had a double-double with 15 rebounds plus 4 steals, 1 assist and 1 blocked shot. Only four players scoring for Kimball with Biesecker with 6, Reader 5, and Hanks 2. Kimball shot well at the line again going 10/14, was 11/54 from the field for 20%, and 3/16 on 3 pointers for 18.7%, somewhat better than the night prior, had 30 rebounds, 10 steals, 4 assists and 3 blocks. 19 fouls and 16 turnovers.

Sutherland had 14 fouls, were 9/41 on 2 pointers, 2/16 on 3 pointers, 19/28 at the foul line, and had 36 rebounds.

Kaley Stokey, a talented senior point guard led the winners in scoring with 16, Morgan Simpson and Haeven Schuster had 10 each.

In commenting on the play of his girls the final two nights, Coach Chauncey Pedersen said, "We simply couldn't have shot any worse than we did Friday, and we did shoot a little bit better on Saturday but we couldn't have shot any worse. We have to regroup and get ready for this week as we have some tough games staring us in the face."

Tough games for certain as Kimball was at Mitchell this past Tuesday to face one of Western Nebraska's better clubs, but a team that Kimball played strong a couple of weeks back when they lost 43-39 to the Lady Tigers at Kimball. Tomorrow night (Friday) it's back to Sutherland to try and gain some revenge, and then Saturday, the SPVA tournament champs come to Kimball and we are talking the North Platte St. Pats Lady Irish club. JV game times at Sutherland are 3:30 with the girls varsity at 5 p.m. and Saturday JV game times are 2 p.m. with the girls varsity at 3:30. Come hungry as it is Music Parents Soup Supper night.

Score by quarter

Kimball 15 6 9 5 - 35

Sutherland 11 9 6 17 - 43

 
 
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