By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Southeast of Saline girl’s basketball team battled valiantly for 32 minutes in Russell on Saturday, but ultimately fell at the hands of #2 Phillipsburg 51-33 in this year’s sub-state final.
The Lady Trojan's still stellar campaign comes to a close at 19-4, while the Lady Panthers stay undefeated at 23-0, and advance to this year’s 3A state tournament.
Southeast was well aware that it would take their best effort of the season to compete with the division-I talent on Phillipsburg’s roster, and SES did an excellent job of keeping Taryn Sides off balance, holding the future K-State Wildcat to just a lone made three in the first half.
“We knew coming in here that we weren’t couldn’t have many empty possessions and we were going to have to match their scoring,” SES head coach Shauna Smith said. “We knew it was going to be hard to come back, being down ten to them is like being down by 20 but overall I thought we did a tremendous job defensively.”
Despite trailing 27-15 at the half, the Lady Trojans never shrank from the challenge, trimming the lead to as little as six in the third quarter, and back down to five in the fourth before the Lady Panthers pulled away late.
One of those big runs came courtesy of Brielle Ptacek, who scored eight of her twelve points in the third quarter, including a pair of big threes to help cut down the deficit.
“They pressure the ball very hard and Brielle getting some good shots up helped relieve that a little,” Smith said. “We spent so much effort cutting the lead down to six and we knew we weren’t going to be able to press them down the stretch.”
Ptacek was joined in double-digit scoring by Maddie Harris, who also tallied twelve points in this game.
On the Phillipsburg side of things, Sides ended her night as the third leading scorer with 11, with the rest of the Panthers coming up big including a game-high 16 points from Kayla Jacobs and 15 more from Heather Schemper.
While this loss does end the Lady Trojan’s season, another successful campaign only adds to the lore of SES girl’s hoops, and a program that has gone 39-8 over the last two years, with three-straight league titles, two appearances in the sub-state finals, and a trip to the 3A state tournament.
“I’m not disappointed in my girls,” Smith said. “We did what we could offensively to execute and we finish the season 19-4 and as league champs, the girls did an excellent job this year.”
The Salina Post would like to thank everyone who followed along throughout our coverage of Southeast of Saline girls’ basketball this season.
For continuing coverage of Trojan and Lady Trojan athletics, stay tuned to the Salina Post.