In four of the Lady Tigers’ five games this season, their opponent has been undefeated at the beginning of the night.
At the beginning of the night.
On Thursday, it was Carl Junction’s turn. The Lady Bulldogs clung to a 50-48 lead in the fourth quarter before hard-charging Republic cranked up the defensive pressure and scored ten straight points on the way to a 58-52 victory.
Taylor Fergen scored 16 points, including 13 in the second half. She was perfect at the free throw line, making all eight of her chances.
Alexis Ladwig scored 15 points on five three-pointers. She has nine treys in the past two games for the Lady Tigers.
Carl Junction (#2 in Class 4) was 6-0 heading into the game, led by junior Alex Vogt and 6’2″ sophomore Megan Scott. Vogt finished with 20 points and Scott scored 13, despite getting in early foul trouble.
“If they’d have had (Scott) the full time, she might have made a huge difference in the game,” Flood says.
Republic led most of the night, but Carl Junction used an 8-0 run to nab a 50-48 lead with about two minutes left in the fourth quarter. At the other end of the floor, Brylee Argo hit a 12-foot jumper just inside the free throw line to tie the game, and Flood called a time out.
When the teams returned to the floor, the Lady Tigers re-established the full-court press they had abandoned earlier in the game.
“I thought if we could get the tempo up maybe with our press, we could get it where it was a track meet,” Flood says. “We were giving up too many easy baskets, so we had to get out of that. We went back to it at the very end. I don’t know if we caught them off guard or what.”
The Lady Tigers forced two quick turnovers, turned them into points, and built an eight-point lead before Carl Junction scored a late basket to account for the final margin.
“I was proud of the kids,” Flood says. “They showed some grit. They could have put their heads down there when we got down two, and they didn’t. They showed a lot of resolve.”
In addition to Fergen and Ladwig, two other Lady Tigers scored in double figures. Jordan Kabetske had 11 points and Brooke Stanfield had ten. Brylee Argo added six.
Republic improves to 5-0, including two wins against teams ranked in the top five in their class by the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association.
“In my time here, I’d say this has been our hardest stretch at the beginning of the season,” Flood says. “There’s been no games where you can basically relax and let down. We’re having to play 32 minutes all the time. Hopefully it just makes you better.”
The schedule doesn’t get easier. Another top five team–Springfield Kickapoo–comes to Republic Monday evening for a game against the Lady Tigers. Kickapoo has one loss, to the top-ranked team in Class 2, Crane. The freshman game will start at 5:00, followed by JV and varsity.
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