IN THE TIGERS’ DEN — Granada-Huntley-East Chain/Truman/Martin Luther’s Olivia Mattson (with basketball) muscles between Springfield’s Marissa Pabst (right) and Katie Thram (front left) during their Section 2A semifinal on Monday night on the Gustavus Adolphus College campus in St. Peter. The Tigers’ Brooklyn Sturm (back left) watches the action in the paint. (Photo by Greg Abel)
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ST. PETER — Junior wing Marissa Pabst tallied a game-leading 25 points to guide the No. 3-seeded Springfield Tigers into the Section 2A championship game.
Pabst and Springfield outlasted the No. 1-seeded Granada-Huntley-East Chain/Truman/Martin Luther Jaguars 61-55 during Monday night’s section semifinal at the Lund Center on the Gustavus Adolphus College campus in St. Peter.
With the win, Springfield (17-11) will advance to play the north side of the bracket’s No. 1 seed Buffalo Lake-Hector/Stewart (26-3) at 6 p.m. Friday night at the Taylor Center on the Minnesota State University campus in Mankato.
Following the loss, the Jaguars (21-7) have been eliminated from the playoffs.
The Tigers got out to an early lead following an offensive rebound and putback lay-in from senior Brooklyn Sturm and were up 6-2 with 14:30 remaining in the opening half.
The Jaguars responded, however, when senior Olivia Mattson nailed a 3-pointer from the wing to cut the Tigers’ lead to 8-7 just a minute later.
Mattson led the way for the Jaguars, finishing the night with 18 points to go with her four rebounds, four assists and five steals.
Another trey ball from sophomore Keira Benck with 8:20 remaining gave the Jaguars a 16-14 lead.
The Jaguars took a slim 28-27 lead into the lockeroom at the break.
In the second half, Pabst took over for the Tigers. She scored six straight points to overtake the Jaguars and give the Tigers a 35-28 lead with 16:30 left in the game.
The Tigers extended their lead to nine points before the Jaguars began fighting their way back into contention.
Keira Benck sank another deep shot for the Jaguars to cut the Tigers’ lead to 38-35 with 13:45 remaining on the ticker.
With 4:50 remaining, the Jaguars were still down by four points when Mattson hit a layup to cut the Tigers’ advantage to 49-47.
Pabst responded on the defensive end by swatting a breakaway layup from Keira Benck to maintain a 57-51 advantage with 1:33 remaining in regulation.
With 38 seconds remaining, Emma Hauger put the game on ice for the Tigers with a successful 1-and-1 trip to the charity stripe. The Tigers would go on to salt the game away from the free throw line and move onto the championship game.
Hauger finished the game with 18 points for the Tigers, while teammate Sturm nearly completed a triple-double with 12 points to go with her 13 boards and a game-high nine assists.
Following the loss, Jaguars head coach TJ Pytleski was proud of his team’s fight.
“In the first half we did a really good job of switching on defense and helping each other out. In the second half that kind of went away,” Pytleski said. “Probably should have made some different adjustments there, we just let them have too many easy layups and on our end we just couldn’t put the ball in the hoop — but overall I’m super proud of the girls. It was a really good season for us.”
Springfield 27-34–61
GHEC/T/ML 28-27–55
SPRINGFIELD (61)
Pabst 12-13 0-0 25, Hauger 6-16 4-4 18, Sturm 5-14 1-2 12, Novotny 2-3 1-3 5, Reese 0-1 1-4 1.
GHEC/T/ML (55)
O. Mattson 7-16 2-2 18, K. Benck 7-14 0-0 16, Be. Petrowiak 3-6 1-4 7, Lewis 3-3 1-2 7, Bowers 1-7 2-2 4, M. Benck 1-8 0-0 3, Br. Petrowiak 0-1 0-0 0, Nowicki 0-1 0-0 0, Geistfeld 0-1 0-0 0.