South drops road game in Devils Lake

The roller coaster ride of the last month continued for Fargo South on Friday night, as they dropped a 70-46 game to the Firebirds in the Devils Lake gym. The loss will likely make the Bruins have to go on the road in the opening round of the post-season. The Firebirds jumped out to a 9-2 and 20-4 lead before the Bruins could hardly turn around. The Firebirds pushed the ball hard in transition and got a number of easy baskets to start the game. South tried to fight back though. Trailing 20-4 with just over 10 minutes left in the half, the Bruins started attacking the basket better on offense and cleaned up their transition defense. A driving basket by Anna Diederich and a steal and layup with a foul and three point play by Maddie Erickson cut the lead to 20-9. Anna Foss made a basket inside, and Maddie Erickson hit a three pointer, and those were followed up by 3 straight baskets by Madeline Strandemo, and with just under 5 minutes left before half, the Bruins had cut the lead to 27-20 and were playing well. But the turnover bug hit the Bruins again, as 5 turnovers in the last 3 minutes of the half gave the Firebirds a 35-22 halftime lead, and the momentum back. In the second half the Bruins could never get the stops they needed to get back into the game, as seemingly every time the Firebirds attacked the basket South ended up getting fouls called on them, and Devils Lake cashed in at the freethrow line, shooting 35 freethrows on the night. But the main problem for South was that they could not stop the duo of Sarah Schafer and Christa Lysne, who dropped in 28 and 23 points respectively, outscoring Fargo South all by themselves. Strandemo led the Bruins with 12 points, while Emily Stroup added 10. Fargo South closes out the regular season next Thursday in West Fargo, as they play the second game of a double header.

play by play of the game
complete boxscore

Boxscore:
Fargo South: Erickson 3 1-1 8, Strandemo 5 1-2 12, Foss 2 0-3 4, Stroup 2 5-6 10, May 1 0-0 2, Diederich 2 0-0 4, Anderson 1 0-0 2, Bisimwa 0 4-4 4; Totals: 16 11-16 46, Three point goals: Strandemo, Erickson, Stroup

Devils Lake: Swanson 1 0-0 2, Lysne 6 11-17 23, Pike 1 0-0 2, Lunday 1 0-0 2, Walford 2 0-0 4, Schafer 10 7-9 28, Knowski 1 2-4 4, Nelson 1 3-4 5; Totals: 23 23-35 70, Three point goals: Schafer