Saryn Brown scored 15 points for North Nodaway, Ellaina Renfro blocked 7 shots, and North Nodaway punched their ticket to Northwest in the Platte Valley Invitational by beating Northeast Nodaway 36-31 Monday in the first round. The Mustangs closed out the game at the free throw line, going 11 for 15 from the line, compared to 4 for 9 for the Bluejays. For Renfro, she showed the kind of shot blocking form that her new assistant coach, Madison (Thompson) Geib, showed all the time when she played for the Mustangs.
For North Nodaway, the question was where to find their scoring from besides Jacquelyn Cline and Saryn Brown and how to stop Dalanie Auffert in the post. Cline and Brown had scored all but four of North Nodaway’s points in their 34-27 win over North Harrison. For Northeast, the game would be a test to see how far they had improved; last year, when most of the same players were on the floor, North Nodaway had pulled away in the second half to win by 15. The Bluejays had won handily against Albany to start the year, but the Warriors were shorthanded.
For North Nodaway, they improved in several areas from their first game. They moved the ball around much better instead of settling for jump shots. While Cline and Brown got their points, combining for 26, the rest of the team stepped up, getting 10 Monday compared to four the week before. And the Mustangs rebounded much better; they outrebounded the Bluejays 33-28, with Saryn Brown getting a double double with 12 boards to go with her 15 points.
For Northeast, they hung with the Mustangs until the last two minutes, when they pulled away at the line. Stymied in the paint by Renfro, who rejected or altered a bunch of Auffert’s attempts, they were able to find balanced scoring, with six players getting into the scoring column. Baylie Busby was aggressive on the floor, getting 9 tips and 3 steals against a good ball handling team while staying on the floor. And Busby’s ball handling kept the Bluejays in the game; she dished out five assists.
North Nodaway hit a couple of early threes to jump out ahead early 6-2, but Northeast hung around for the remainder of the half; they were shadowing Cline all over the floor and held her in check for a while. The Bluejays even took a 12-8 lead before Cline was finally able to get loose and slash to the rim for a basket and add a 3-pointer to put the Mustangs in front 13-12.
With the Bluejays shadowing Cline, whose early scoring outburst in last year’s game helped North Nodaway floor them for the count, Saryn Brown came alive in the third quarter, getting eight points as the Mustangs raised their lead to as much as four. But Sasha Deardorff scored four straight to tie it up at 22 after three before Skyler Florea put the Bluejays in front to start the fourth 24-22.
Florea fouled out and Brown got going to put the Mustangs ahead, and Lauren Herndon added a steal to make it 27-24. But Northeast rallied to go ahead 30-29 on Jaden Atkins’ shot. Atkins led the Bluejays with 10 points.
But Jacquelyn Cline hit two free throws to put North Nodaway back in front, the Mustangs got a stop on defense, and they went to their delay game, running it down to one minute before the Bluejays fouled. Northeast put Ellaina Renfro on the line, which made sense as she only scored 10 points all last year, but she made both free throws to make it 33-30, Jaden Atkins missed a three, and Saryn Brown went two for two to ice the game with 43 seconds left despite Northeast’s frantic efforts at the end.
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