By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Salina Central girls basketball team dominated Lansing in their state semifinal cruising to a 68-37 victory to punch their ticket to the state championship game on Saturday.
Lansing came in as the #5 team in Class 5A and the Lady Mustangs went in expecting a battle, but dominated the last three quarters to waltz through the semis.
“I thought that game was going to be a lot tighter,” Central head coach Chris Fear said. “There was no question that we were confident and we really opened it up in the middle quarters, I thought we played really well on defense and when we started to execute on offense we pulled away.”
The Lady Stangs led by just a single point after a quarter but outscored the Lions 40-10 in the second and third, building an insurmountable lead going into the final eight minutes.
“We knew that Lansing had a huge third quarter in their quarterfinal game and we really wanted to win that one which we certainly did,” Fear said. “We started the second half on a 7-0 run and really shut them down on offense, that might have been our best quarter of the year.”
Chaliscia Samilton led the Lady Mustangs with 19 points on 8-12 shooting in one of the most efficient Central games of a still-undefeated season.
“I thought we found a mismatch inside with Chaliscia and when that happens teams don’t know what to do because they generally overhelp on our perimeter early,” he said. “When we’re scoring well inside that makes us really difficult to guard.”
Central shot 45% from the floor, 9-18 from deep, and 81% from the line as Aubrie Kierscht and Hampton Williams each added 13 more to the winning effort.
Lansing’s season comes to a close at 20-4 while the Lady Mustangs advance to the state championship game looking for one last win to bring home the first state title in program history.
“Playing for a state championship has been our goal all season long,” Fear said. “We’re excited about the opportunity but we know that we want a little bit more and we’re not just thrilled to be here.”
For continuing coverage of Central at state stay tuned to the Salina Post.