South 55, Campus 46

In starting the season 0-6, one issue for the Salina South Lady Cougars was the fact they were playing several very talented teams. They had no margin for error and as a result could not find a win, until this week when they got two. In Tuesday’s 12-point road win over Newton, the Cougars had the game in hand after three quarters and were never threatened late. On Friday at Campus, South had to find a way to win when the game was very much in doubt. Collectively, the team made the plays on both ends to pull away for a 55-46 victory.

Each team scored in small bunches and traded the lead in the first half. Campus led 12-10 after one quarter and then the Cougars put up 19 second quarter points to lead 29-26 at the half. Junior Kalysa Hamel, who on Tuesday against Newton had set a career-high with 11 points, set another high with four first-half three-pointers and 12 points to lead the South offense.

The Colts scored the first six points of the third to take a three-point lead. South would respond to jump ahead by two before Campus tied the score on two occasions, the last being at 36-all. Acacia Weis’ three put South ahead and Lizzy Franco’s long jumper put the Cougars up by five at the end of the third.

Each side labored to score early in the fourth. Then, the Colts got a three from Tya Tindall to trim the South lead to two at 43-41. But, that would be as close at Campus got down the stretch. Weis and Sydney Peterson hit threes and Kylie Arnold made a pair of free throws to help spread the lead out and the Cougars were able to get defensive stops to close it out.

Hamel’s five treys and 15 points led the Cougars. Weis scored 12, Arnold 11 and Franco 10 which matched the career-high she set in the win at Newton just three days earlier. Campus got 21 from Tindall to lead all scorers.

South is now 2-6 and is riding high heading into next week’s SIT. They will host Buhler in an opening round game next Thursday at 5:00pm.