Lady Longhorns runner-up at Kimball Invite

The Kimball High Lady Longhorns made it to the championship of their own Kimball Invitational Tournament, but Dundy County-Stratton emerged as the girl's champion in the season opening action for the four schools involved. Kimball had a battle to get past Morrill in first round play, winning out 56-49 while DCS won over Potter-Dix 56-38 to advance. It was nip and tuck the entire first half of the Kimball contest with Morrill with the Lady Horns taking a 15-14 lead after the first period and was on top 30-27 at half time. The Lady Horns out scored the Lady Lions 12-6 in the third period to lead 42-33 entering the final quarter of play. A strong showing at the foul line by Alex Reader put the game away in the final seconds with the sharp shooting junior converting 9 of 13 free throws in the final period and was 14 of 18 for the game at the charity stripe ending up with 27 points to take game scoring honors. As a team, Kimball shot 21 of 37 at the line for 57 percent.

Kate Reader joined her sister in double figures in the win with 12 points and was top rebounder with 10. Justine Heeg had six points, Jannel Fiehtner 4, Hannah Biesecker 3, Madison Wynne and Alexis Lulf two each. Alex Reader also tossed in three treys helping her reach her 27 total. Heeg led in steals with four while Fiehtner had three along with eight rebounds and a team high three assists. As a team Kimballl pulled 33 rebounds, had 11 steals and 29 turnovers.

Kimball 15 15 12 14 – 56

Morrill 14 13 6 16 – 49

Dundy County-Stratton showed why they are a pre-season top ten ranking in the Omaha World Herald, listed in the number four spot in class D-1, as they came out strong to jump to a 31-9 first quarter lead and completely dominated from start to finish in winning 72-32 in a display of overall talent. They were as strong on defense as they were on offense.

The Lady Tigers were 20 of 29 at the foul line and hit four three-pointers on the night. They were led by Aubrey Frederick with 24 points, Emily Jones had 19 and Kami Porter 11.

Kate Reader was Kimball's lone scorer in double figures with 11 helped by 7/10 shooting at the foul line. Alex Reader was held to just seven, 20 points shy of her Friday night showing, and hit one trey. Kimball had seven players with two points each as the Lady Horns shot a dismal 10/42 from the field, going 1/10 on three-point attempts, and was 11/18 from the foul line. Kate Reader also was top rebounder with ten, with Fiehtner charted with five boards. As a team, Kimball had 30 rebounds, seven steals, six assists, and 29 turnovers. Madison Wynne led in steals with three.

As pleased as he was with the play on Friday night in the win over Morrill, coach Chauncey Pedersen was very disappointed with the play of his ladies in the Saturday night loss.

"We did some good things in the win over Morrill and played as a team. Not taking anything away from Dundy County, as they are a very good team, but we simply didn't do much right. We won't face Dundy County again this year, but we are going to face a lot of good teams and if we don't want to get blown out again we need to get prepared to face some more strong clubs on our schedule. I told the girls to expect some serious practice sessions this week."

Kimball will host Perkins County tomorrow night (Friday) and the Grant girls are not as strong as in some previous years and lost to Wray, Colo., 81-21 this past weekend. Saturday Kimball is at Morrill and the Lady Lions will be hard to beat again playing on their home court. Game times Friday are 4 p.m. for the JV games and 5:30 for the girl's varsity. Saturday girl's game times are 1 and 4 p.m.

Dundy Co. 31 17 13 11 - 72

Kimball 9 9 10 4 – 32