Long Ways to go for Bluejay Girls.

When playing tough teams, one tends to learn a lot about themselves that they might not have otherwise. And so it was for Northeast Nodaway's girls in their 73-54 loss to Craig/Fairfax (CFX). The first lesson is that they can score against almost everyone short of Jefferson. But the second is that they have a long ways to go before they can challenge either CFX or Jefferson in the upcoming district tournament in Burlington Junction. And with the season winding down, the Bluejays have to get better in a hurry.

"We had to hold them under 45 to have a chance to win," said Coach Ryan Davis. But not only did Northeast fail to buy a stop, they allowed CFX's two best players, Amanda Geib (25 points) and Whitney Harrington (21 points), to combine for over 45 points alone. The trouble began when Blair Schmitz picked up two quick fouls at the start of the game, allowing CFX to turn a manageable 6-4 deficit into a 28-11 deficit at the end of the first quarter, as nobody was able to stop Geib in the post from scoring at will. She was constantly getting behind defenders for backdoor layups as CFX ran their weave offense against the man to man to perfection; when Northeast went to a zone to try to stop her, Harrington would drop 3-pointers. And if Northeast would help out on Geib, Harrington would go to the basket and either dish off or go in for the layup.

Schmitz picked up her third foul early in the second quarter, but Northeast prevented it from getting any worse. Michelle Schulte, who has been improving her point production, had a 3-pointer and Kristin Sherry took a charge at the end of the half which seemed to fire up Northeast going into the second half. When the Bluejays took the floor in the beginning of the third, they looked like a completely different team. "We played our A game in the second half," said Davis. "Our players have to understand that in order to beat Jefferson, South Nodaway, and CFX, we have to play our A game the whole time."

Jacqueline Schulte hit two 3-pointers right off the bat and Michelle Schulte added another one as Northeast got right back in the game with a 10-0 run. Taylor Dougan came off the bench to hit another 3-pointer and Michelle Schulte hit a pair of free throws and Northeast got the game back into single digits at 43-35. Then, at the start of the fourth, Kristin Sherry hit from the right corner after some good ball reversal and Michelle Schulte hit a 3-pointer after a kickout from Jacqueline to make it 48-42. But the bugs that have been haunting Northeast all year came back to bite as they had a chance to cut it to four, but failed to use the backboard on a close-range shot.

CFX never gave them another chance as they went back to attacking the basket and getting easy looks for Geib and Harrington as CFX got into the bonus and got back in control. Their free throw shooting was a key stat in the game as they made 20 out of their 24 free throws on the night. A 3-point play from Geib and free throws from Geib and Harrington pushed the margin back to 58-44, and the Bulldogs got a ton of easy layups down the stretch to push the margin back to 19.