Lady Raiders Win Cabela's Shootout

Sidney's Lady Raider basketball team excelled in an early season tournament test, beating Burns, Wyo., and Beatrice to take the girl's title at the Cabela's Holiday Shoot-Out Invitational Tournament on Friday and Saturday.

The event was originally scheduled for Thursday through Saturday, but weather complications shortened the tournament to just Friday and Saturday.

Friday afternoon, Sidney squared off against the Burns, Wyo., team and quick established that the Lady Raiders would be in control of a physical contest. The Lady Raiders ended the first period up 16-to-6, although the score should have been much greater in their favor, but missed easy shots and turnovers early kept the scoring low.

In the second period, Sidney got their scoring touch down, and their defense played lights out against the Wyoming team that struggled to get off an effective shot, much less score. By the end of the half, the Lady Raiders had taken an insurmountable 35-to-8 lead, limiting the Burns squad to just two points in the second period.

The second half continued with Sidney piling on the points, and getting easy shots off under the boards. With the "mercy rule" enacted for most of the fourth period, the Lady Raiders cruised to a 62-to-18 final score. Junior Mattie Johnson lead the Sidney scoring with her domination under the boards, putting up 13 total points.

On Saturday, the Lady Raiders faced a totally different challenge from Beatrice, the team that bounced them last year from the state tournament.

The game started with with strong defense on both sides, with nearly two minutes going by before Beatrice finally took a 2-to-0 lead. Sidney had trouble getting inside on the Lady Orange, and when they did they missed their shots.

Beatrice led the majority of the period 6-to-0, but Sidney came back in the final moments of the first period to tie the game at six.

The second period began with a three-point shootout, with Beatrice putting up two three pointers against Sidney's one to take a 14-to-9 lead. Sidney senior Janay Brauer finally got on the board with two free throws, but the Lady Raiders had trouble throughout the period making shots.

Beatrice was very patient with their offensive sets, and converted for points to take a 21-to-17 halftime lead.

Sidney came out more aggressively on offense to start the third, and junior Nicole Birner nailed a three pointer followed by senior Megan Ross finding Brauer with a cross court pass on a fast break for an easy two points to cut the lead to 23-to-22. Sophomore Karly Sylvester and senior Mattie Johnson started to dominate under the boards, grabbing rebounds and scoring, and the Lady Raiders finished the quarter with a 30-to-29 lead.

The fourth quarter settled in with Beatrice being extremely patient on offense, passing the ball and looking for the best opportunity to score. But the Sidney defense was even more patient, letting the Beatrice team work the ball while waiting for their opportunities for turnovers.

This strategy worked, as Beatrice burned a lot of time off the clock, while turning the ball over in consecutive sequences for Sidney scores.

The teams traded scores for the remainder of the quarter until Beatrice was forced to foul, and then ran out of time to make up ground. Beatrice had one last chance to tie the game, but Johnson was able to steal the inbounds pass, and let the clock run out for a 39-to-37 victory. Johnson again led the scoring for Sidney with 12 points.

Sidney head coach Tyler Shaw was pleased with the girls' effort, saying, "the game against Beatrice was a good back and forth battle.  We are really happy with the way the girls responded to Beatrice shooting the ball so well from the outside.  They are a dangerous team when they are hitting 3 pointers.  We were able to make a few defensive stands at the right time and turn those into points down the stretch, then we held on at the end by making a huge defensive stop."