By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Southeast of Saline girls basketball team got back to their winning ways, knocking off the rival Trojans of Beloit 54-47 on Friday night.
“Our first three games have been good ones and we knew this wasn't going to be a walk in the park,” SES head coach Shauna Smith said. “Beloit is a much-improved team and they’re a year older with some size inside and good coaching.”
Before the game, Coach Smith said the team would simply need more scoring to compete in this game, and score they did with two players in double-digits en route to the team's first 50+ point performance of the year.
20 of those points came in the first quarter as SES headed to the break up 20-14.
Beloit got their first lead of the game with 2:24 left to go in the third but Avery Caselman immediately knocked down a triple to get Southeast back on top.
“I remember looking up and seeing that they had the lead but Avery showed confidence and knocked down that three,” Smith said. “It felt like we had control throughout the whole game and we had a lot of confidence that we were going to get the job done.”
The teams were tied going into the final quarter but SES slammed the door shut from the free-throw line, knocking down 7-12 en route to an eight-point victory.
Karsyn Schlesener led the way for Southeast with 18 points and was joined in double figures by Avery Caselman who dropped 12.
Tatem Tietjens and Peyton Remus managed 17 and 10 for Beloit in the loss, but SES doubled them up in free throws and the disparity at the line proved to be too much to handle.
Down the stretch, Southeast secured a number of key boards and forced 16 turnovers on the night while coughing up just seven.
“Rebounding is a ‘want’ thing and last year we instilled that in them,” Smith said. “If we didn’t rebound we ran and tonight when the game was on the line tonight we got the boards.”
SES will be back in action next Tuesday when they travel to Abilene for an area rivalry game with the 4A Cowgirls.