2020 Minnesota Girl's State Tournament - Class AAAA Quarterfinal Game - Lakeville North vs STMA 3-11-20

The 4:00 P.M. game on this Wednesday afternoon featured another intriguing contest with Lakeville North taking on third-seeded STMA.  The Panthers had caught fire in the Section 3AAAA tournament and catapulted their way to Williams Arena with a win over Rosemount.  The Knights meanwhile ran roughshod in Section 8AAAA and defeated Maple Grove in that championship game to return to state.  I had watched STMA play earlier this season and knew full and well that this is a very explosive team.

That explosiveness was in full view as STMA bolted out to a 17-10 lead by the 11:20 mark of the first half.  Knights senior guard Mackenzie Kramer would make that lead grow to 19-10 with her two free throws at the 10:28 mark.  Lakeville North would cut into this deficit on a score in the paint by sophomore guard Michaela Juaire at the 9:28 mark but STMA's Kramer would build it back up with her three-point bomb from the left corner with 8:51 left.  With 7:14 left, Kramer would again strike from behind the arc that would grow the Knights lead to thirteen at 29-16.  With 5:15 left in the first half, Lakeville North senior standout guard Lauren Jensen would make a hard drive for a finish to reduce the deficit to eleven at 29-18 but STMA would answer that with another three-point bomb - this one by senior forward Lily Tennyson with 5:15 left and Kramer would unleash another "3" with 4:35 left to make it 35-18.  With 3:37 left, lanky freshman guard Tessa Johnson would unleash a "3" of her own to grow the lead to 38-20 and with 2:24 left, Tennyson would connect with another three-point bomb - this one from the left corner to make it 41-22.  With just :06 left, Kramer would bury a cold-blooded "3" from the top as STMA took a cozy 45-25 lead into the locker room at the half.  A quick check of the stats at the half showed that Lakeville North and Head Coach Shelly Clemons had indeed had to endure an artillery barrage of three-point bombs from their opponent.  For starters, STMA was 15-25 from FG range for 60% and 11-18 from behind the arc for 61%.  Compare that with Lakeville North's 11-28 from FG range for 39.3% and 2-11 from downtown for 18.2% .  And Lakeville North was going to have to find some way to slow down STMA's Kramer who had already collected 18 first half points. 

To their credit, the Panthers started showing signs of life early in the second half and had the deficit trimmed down to sixteen at 45-29 by the 14:58 mark and a steal and lay-up by Jensen at the 14:10 mark kept the deficit at 16 at 47-31.  Senior guard Morgan Robison's lay-up at the 13: 32 mark made further inroads and that prompted STMA Head Coach Kent Hamre to take a match to a timeout to discuss things with his team.  Still, with 13:10 left, senior guard Sarah Kuma would get one free throw to go down and then with 12:48 left, Kuma would strike again with a lay-up that now had the deficit down to eleven at 47-36.  But the Panthers could never quite find that one big three-pointer that might have seriously swung the momentum in their favor and that allowed STMA to slowly but surely steady the ship.  At the 9:17 mark, the Knights lead had grown back to thirteen at 51-38 and a Johnson "3" from the right corner at the 8:50 mark increased that lead to 54-38.  With 5:50 left, STMA sophomore guard Emma Miller delivered a cold-blooded "3" to make ti 59-45.  Still, Lakeville North would make one last gamble and a "3" by Kuma with 4:02 left finally drew the Panthers back within single-digit range down 59-50 and a Jensen lay-up with 2:46 left kept Lakeville North in that nine-point range down 61-52.  With 1:58 left, Kuma would make things even more interesting with one free throw to trim the deficit to eight at 61-53.  With 1:08 left, Jensen would bang home a "3" from the right wing to get the deficit down to seven at 63-56.  But STMA would close the door for good.  Two free throws by junior guard Kendal Cox with :48 left and two more by Johnson with :27 left helped seal the deal as the Knights advanced to the semifinals with a 67-58 victory.

Lakeville North's Clemons was more than willing to accept the blame for the artillery barrage of three-point bombs her team had to absorb in that first half as she said that she and her staff concentrated on getting the "gaps" closed in the half court and was hopeful that they wouldn't endure a Nuremberg-like air raid that they absorbed in that first half.  "We knew that they had good shooters.....I kind of take the fall for that one because I think we over-emphasized the drive in practice and we really wanted to cover gaps and we did a good job of doing that.  Unfortunately, they (the team) kind of gave up the three-point shot.....We were kind of relying on; hoping that they'd miss the first one or two and get cold out there but the opposite happened and, so, we had to adjust in the second half and the adjustment seemed to work.  Looking back, I sure wish we would have started the game that way."  I asked Clemons specifically about the little run they made at the beginning of the second half that allowed them to narrow the deficit somewhat.  "I think that, they hit so many threes in that first half and we're a team that emphasizes defense so much......So when teams get hot on us, I think it makes us a little flat on the offensive end.....We're really energized making stops and getting it out and play in the open court on the offensive end....And when they keep shooting it like that and we take it out we get a little flat; standing around."  I asked Lakeville North's Jensen about the struggles she and her team had to endure this season and how they seemed to find themselves again just in the nick of time for the Section 1AAAA tournament and into the State Tournament.  "Yeah.....We've had a really tough schedule and we talked about that a lot....Even though we lost some games, it really helped us and we learned a lot and it's a long season....And we knew if we kept working, we knew that everything would fall into place."  STMA's Hamre would be in the press conference room a bit later along with Kramer and Hamre was gushing with pride about how Kramer just broke the STMA all-time scoring record with today's game.  I asked Hamre about even though his team had a great shooting performance in the first half, I thought his squad stepped things up on defense as well.  "Yeah, we talked about getting two or three stops in a row; to limit their possessions.....Unfortunately we're not a team with a lot of long possessions.  We want to push the ball."  I asked Hamre if there was perhaps any panic that might have set in with his team when Lakeville North got the deficit down to single digits late in the game.  "For me, yes there was panic; probably not for the kids....But for me there was panic....You look across the court on the other side and you've got a Lauren Jensen who can take over a game.....You get a kid like that, she's pretty tough to stop so yeah, there was a little bit of panic."  Hamre also talked about the school's move to the Lake Conference and he said that, without question, it's made his squad a better and tougher team because they knew night in and night out, they were going to have an incredibly tough opponent to play and there's simply no nights off in that conference. 

Even though STMA cooled off somewhat in that second half from downtown, they still wound up shooting 13-25 for the game for 52%.  And although Lakeville North did pick up their shooting in the second half, it still wasn't enough to overcome that twenty-point deficit they faced at the half.  Indeed, what a day it was for STMA's Kramer as she tallied 22 points enroute to breaking the STMA all-time scoring record - congrats to her!  But Kramer got a lot of help from Johnson with 15 points and Cox who added 12 points and Tennyson who finished with 11 points to round out a very balanced attack.  Lakeville North's Jensen would also finish with 22 points on this day and Kuma would add 17 points.