The Lynchburg-Clay girls (23-1) showed everyone exactly why they are the no. 1 seed in their bracket, defeating the Westfall Lady Mustangs 60-48 in the district semi finals on Thursday night.
In their sectional finals game, the Lady Mustangs had a slow start. Thursday night was a completely different story. The Westfall girls were the first on the board as 30 seconds into the game, they were sent to the free throw line and able to make one of the two shots. After that, the Lady Mustangs put on a show, scoring 13 points unanswered over the next four minutes. In the quarter, both McKayla Binkley and Peyton Scott had three baskets each, Hannah Binkley had one basket and a three pointer from the corner, Lexi Waits added a basket of her own, and Ali Little sank two from the free throw line. At the end of the first eight minutes, it was Lynchburg on top 21-5.
Some teams will get out to a big earlier lead and then get complacent and allow their opponents to slowly work themselves back into the game but not the Lady Mustangs. Even though the Lynchburg girls slowed their game down a little and didn’t rack up as many points in the second quarter (9), they maintained their lead, even adding to it, outscoring Westfall 9-6 in the second and took a 30-11 lead into halftime.
As the second half started, the Lady Mustangs came out and picked up right where they left off after the first quarter. They were able to hold Westfall to only 12 points while scoring 21 themselves and had a 51-23 lead going into the final quarter.
In the final quarter, the Lady Mustangs maintained their lead. The Westfall girls scored 19 points to the Lynchburg’s nine, but nine of those Westfall points were from the free throw line. In the end, the Lady Mustangs secured their ticket to the district finals to be held Saturday, February 27 right back at Waverly.
“Westfall is a good team and has a couple kids that can shoot the three,” said Lynchburg Head Coach Whitney Lewis after the game. “I think we held them to just two. Our defense really gives other teams problems and our pressure there in the first quarter was great. I thought we came out with great intensity that really set the tone for the rest of the game and kind of through [Westfall] out of their offense so I was really pleased with that.”
The Lynchburg girls will move on to play next Saturday against either the no. 2 seed Southeastern or the no. 3 seeded Fairland. Lynchburg demolished Southeastern in the Paint Valley Classic at the beginning of the year with a final score of 72-35.
“Anybody who moves up at this point in the season is going to be a good team whether we played them or not,” said coach Lewis about the next game outlook. “Southeastern won 16 or 17 games in a row during the season so if they’re the winner, we have to be ready to go.”
The Lady Mustangs were led by Peyton Scott with 18 points on Thursday night followed by junior twins Hannah and McKayla Binkley, who celebrated their 17th birthdays, with 16 and 13 points respectively. With the 16 points, Hannah Binkley is now just 11 points away from scoring her 1,000th point.
Box:
LCHS – 21 9 21 9 – 60
WHS – 5 6 12 19 – 42
Lynchburg-Clay: Scott 7(1) 1/2 – 18; H. Binkley 4(2) 2/2 – 16; M. Binkley 5 (1) 0/2 – 13; Little 1(1) 2/2 – 7; Thiel 2 0/1 – 4; Waits 1 0/1 – 2. Totals: 20(5) 5/10 – 60
Westfall: Stonerock 5 5/8 – 15; K. Robinson 1 8/10 – 10; Walker 1(1) 1/2 – 6; E. Robinson 1(1) – 5; Wickline 1 – 2; Mathes 1 0/2 – 2; Patterson 1 – 2. Totals: 11(2) 14/22 – 42
Reach Robert Stegbauer at 937-393-3456 ext. 1679 or on Twitter @RStegbauer.
