By TYLER HENRY
Lead Sportswriter - Salina Post
The Southeast of Saline basketball teams started the new year with a bang, sweeping Republic County on the road in a pair of confident wins.
Southeast would take the girl’s game 50-28 and the boy’s game 69-43 in a great all-around night for the purple and white.
Girls: SE of Saline 50, Republic County 28
The Lady Trojans made the most of their two weeks off during the winter break and re-entered the fray with a flurry of points, outscoring Republic County 25-8 in the opening quarter and never looking back.
“We wanted to get out and keep the tempo up early and I thought we changed some things up that worked for us in our press,” SES head coach Shauna Smith said. “They adjusted and fought through some things but we only gave up one layup off our press all night.”
While the offense slowed down a bit over the final three quarters, Southeast maintained their defensive standard of excellence, holding the Lady Buffs to just 11 second-half points and allowing just three second-half field goals.
Six different Lady Trojans got in on the scoring fun but it was Aba Pearson who shone the brightest, splitting 20 points evenly between the two halves.
Pearson was joined in double figures by Reese Heinrich (11) with five more teammates contributing at least four points in the win.
Just four Lady Buffaloes scored in this game, led by Kylie Stone (12) and Avery Stindt (11)
With this victory the Lady Trojans advance to 3-2 on the year and remain undefeated in league play at 0-2 while Republic County falls to 1-4 and 0-3.
Boys: SE of Saline 69, Republic County 43
The boy’s game saw Southeast of Saline set a new high watermark on the year and collect their first win against an ailing Buffalo foe, leading 31-14 at halftime and pulling away from there.
“We were really good in the first quarter, we let up a little bit near the end of the half but we came out strong out of halftime after that,” SES head coach Francis Flax said. “We did a lot of good things tonight and I liked that we didn’t have a lot of turnovers tonight.”
Southeast forced 15 turnovers in this game while taking care of the ball themselves, surrendering just six.
Gannon Jacobson carried the torch in the first half, scoring 16 points in the first two quarters as part of a game-high 20-point performance.
In the second half, Owen Bailey started to heat up from all over the floor, tallying 13 of his 17 points in the third quarter alone.
By the final buzzer eight different Trojans had contributed at least one bucket with four players chipping in eight or more.
Republic County also had two players in double figures on a night where Aden Morris scored 13 and Conner Martin dropped 10.
Southeast gets their first notch in the win column at 1-4 overall and 1-1 in league play while the Buffaloes continue their search for a first win at 0-5 and 0-3.
Both SES teams will be back in action on Tuesday when they travel to Salina to battle Sacred Heart.