#6 Seward Wins 20th For 23rd Straight Season
| Final | 1 | 2 | T | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Garden City Community College (12-11, 3-6) | 29 | 28 | 57 |
|
Seward County Community College (20-2, 8-1) | 37 | 34 | 71 |
While winning has been a theme for the 6th ranked Seward County Lady Saints this season, the gals in green also realize that winning at Seward has been going on a long time and Monday night in the Greenhouse proved just that as the 2015 version of the Lady Saints picked up their 20th win of the year with a 71-57 victory over visiting Garden City, marking the 23rd straight season that the Seward program has eclipsed the 20 win mark.
It was a shooting contest early on for Seward County and Garden City as the Lady Saints and Lady Busters traded three pointers with the Busters cashing in one more than the Lady Saints to take a 9-6 lead four minutes in. The first two point basket of the game came at the 14:35 mark when Daniela Galindo drew Seward to within one and the Lady Saints took their first lead of the game at the 10:40 mark as Axelle Bernard connected on a jumper to make it 16-15 Seward. After an answer by the Busters, Rebekah Hatchard continued her hot shooting with a three pointer to give the Lady Saints a 19-17 lead at the first half media timeout and Seward closed the half strong, outscoring Garden City 6-1 over the final 2:55 of the period to take a 37-29 lead into the locker room at half.
The Lady Saints shot 42% in the field half while holding the Busters to just 32% shooting. Seward played relatively clean, turning it over just 5 times in the first 20 minutes while Garden was efficient as well, getting up 31 shots with just 7 giveaways. The Lady Saints first half scoring was balanced as five players had 6 or more points without a single player with more than 8.
Garden City began the second half ice cold and the Lady Saints took advantage, quickly stretching their lead to 13 with the first five points of the half. Seward continued to lead big to the midway point of the half, pushing their advantage to 51-37 on a three from Hatchard with 12:36 remaining. Just when it looked like the Lady Saints might run away with the victory against the struggling Busters, Garden City used a 6-0 run out of a timeout to quickly cut the Seward lead to just eight at 51-43. A big three from straight ahead from Bernard pushed the Seward lead back to double digits and the Lady Saints slowly increased their lead as the clock began to work against Garden City until a pullup jumper by Brooklyn Artis put the dagger in the Busters and gave the Lady Saints their largest lead of the game at 69-51 with 2:40 to go. The Busters tried to make a push with time winding down, but in the end it was too much Seward County as the Lady Saints went on to win 71-57.
Seward shot 56% in the second half to finish the game at 48% overall while Garden City had a rough night shooting, connecting on just 29% in the second half to finish just a tick above 30% on the night. The Lady Saints got a huge performance out of Bernard in the win who finished with 12 points and a career high 15 rebounds, 12 coming in the second half in her fifth double-double of the year. Kyndal Davis and Brooklyn Artis each had 15 points to lead the Lady Saints in the win while Davis added 6 rebounds and Artis 6 assists. Hatchard finished with 14 points and nailed four more three pointers to run her season total to 42.
The Lady Saints improve to 20-2 overall on the season and remain snugly in 2nd place in the Jayahwk West standings at 8-1, just one game behind Hutchinson as the second half of league play kicks off. The win marks the 23rd straight season that the Seward County program has reached the 20 win mark, a streak dating all the way back to the 1992 season. Garden City continues a rough conference season, falling to 12-11 overall and 3-6 in league play where they are now in a 6th place tie with Colby.
Seward will continue a busy stretch of 5 games in 9 days on Wednesday when they travel to the Community Building in Colby to take on the Lady Trojans in a 6:00 tip. The Lady Saints return home on Saturday where they will host the Pratt Lady Beavers in another 6:00 start.