It wasn’t pretty but Maple Grove advances
Prep Girls Hoops Kansas Scouting Report
Marc Hugunin
<p>In the 1st half, Elk River did everything that it could to stay close to a bigger, stronger, more experienced opponent on the road, and it did so almost to perfection to come away with a 16-16 halftime tie. In the 2nd half, Maple Grove did what it had to do to finally put away its smaller, younger visitor, 41-33.</p>
<p>The Elks had the tallest starter in 6-1 senior post Matia Person, but Maple Grove enjoyed a 4 to 5 inch advantage at 3 positions. In the early going, the Crimson waited patiently for a switch in the Elks man defense, and exploited a pair of ungodly mismatches to tie things up at 4-4. Meanwhile, 5-5 sophomore guard Lydia Haack scored 7 of the Elks 1st 9 points, and Elk River was up 9-6 at about 12 minutes.</p>
<p>There were 15 scores in the 1st half, and 14 of them resulted in a lead change or a tie. The 2 teams shot 9-of-36 with 14 turnovers. Maple Grove quit waiting for those mismatches, and Elk River persisted in taking the ball inside where, against the Crimson’s long arms, the Elks shot maybe 6 or 8 airballs on layups for the night.</p>
<p>After giving up just 16 points in the 1st half on 4-of-19 shooting, Maple Grove tightened up its defense in the 2nd half, giving up 17 points on 5-of-26 shooting. The Elks certainly couldn’t get an open look inside. In the 2nd half, they couldn’t get an open look outside. The game’s signature play came just inside of 4 minutes when freshman 5-10 guard Jordyn Lamker batted a Haack 3-pointer into the cheap seats.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the Crimson started spreading the floor at the 10 minute mark while leading just 25-19. After that they scored more easily on back cuts and off the offensive glass, making 3-of-8 shots down the stretch. Yeah, I know that’s just 37.5 percent but before that it had been 7-of-27, or 26 percent. They also made 8-of-13 FT inside of 3 minutes to put it away.</p>
<p>5-11 senior forward Katrina Theis led Maple Grove with 17 points on 5-of-11 shooting with 12 rebounds and 3 steals, as Augsburg coach Ted Riverso watched. The other 5-11 senior forward, Autumn Mlinar, who is headed to Wayne State, added 10 points on 4-of-7 shooting, and also added 3 steals. The 2 of them shot 9-of-18 for Maple Grove. Everybody else shot 1-of-17.</p>
<p>Haack scored 11 points for the Elks on 2-of-9 shooting. Person scored 5 points on just 1-of-8 shooting, but added 11 rebounds and 2 blocks.</p>
<p>It wasn’t pretty, but Maple Grove did what it had to do, and thus advances to play Moorhead in a section semi-final this coming Saturday at an as yet unspecified location.</p>
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