Picture courtesy of Tanner Colvin

FINAL:

WAMEGO 43

SALINA CENTRAL 34

Friday afternoon’s SIT semifinal featured a rematch of last year’s opening round meeting between Salina Central and Wamego. Entering just its second year playing in the SIT, the Wamego girls earned the No. 1 seed and boasted a record of 12-1 heading into Friday.

Last year’s first round matchup went to Wamego 38-34, and the Lady Mustangs hoped history would not repeat itself.

Both teams took time finding their footing on what had to have been a strange change to the players internal clocks. Turning around and playing in the early afternoon after playing the night before is already different enough, but with it being a school day, the challenge was greater.

Wamego jumped out to a 13-3 lead and because of Central’s half court defense, they had to battle for all 13 of those early points.

While the Lady Mustangs couldn’t find the bottom of the net from the field early on, they were getting to the free throw line and that helped keep them within shouting distance.

One their first field goal went through, a 3-pointer by Makambri Hastings, the made shots came in bunches. Central trimmed the lead down to 16-14 at halftime. Early in the third, they tied it at 16-16 and showed they weren’t going down easy.

A defensive matchup to follow throughout the game was Central’s Lexie Guerrero against Wamego’s senior leader Lexie Hecht. Hecht had a rough night from the floor and was constantly harassed by Guerrero, who took the assignment of guarding the team’s opposing ball handler very seriously. Hecht was held to an inefficient 10 points.

Wamego’s best player was sophomore Kendall Mayer. Mayer was a difficult matchup inside and finished with 17 points.

Salina Central’s Grace Ostmeyer had her second consecutive strong effort with 13 points to lead the Lady Mustangs. With back-to-back impressive showings in the SIT, you can put her name down for All-Tournament Team already.

In the fourth quarter, Salina Central could not find enough offense to climb all the way back once Wamego went ahead by double digits. The No. 1 seed Wamego advanced to 13-1 with the win and clinched a berth in Monday night’s girls SIT championship against Wichita East.

Salina Central will now prepare for the third place game against Salina South on Monday afternoon.