LINGLE – The Lingle-Fort Laramie girls’ basketball team split weekend games with the Crawford (Neb.) Lady Rams and the Guernsey-Sunrise Lady Vikings.
On Friday, the Lady Doggers fell on the road to Crawford, 46-27.
“We ran into a tough team last night up in Crawford. Their record isn’t indicative how tough of a team they are. I actually expect them to make a run in the Nebraska playoffs at the end of the year,” L-FL coach Matt Cornelius said. “We are a young team and had a tough time with their aggressive press. The thing I will say about our girls, they never slowed down, and they continued to attack and play hard.”
L-FL was led in scoring by freshman Natalie Speckner with six, while sophomore Ashley Hattan added five. Junior M’Lynn Hill led the team in rebounding with six.
The next day, the Lady Doggers rolled to a 55-15 victory on a night when they honored the team’s lone senior Kaylie Rafferty.
“I’m proud they came back today with (the loss) under their hat and competed,” Cornelius said.
It was a career night for the senior who led the team with 15 points on 4-of-8 shooting, to go along with three rebounds.
“I can’t say enough good things about Kaylie Rafferty. It was a real special afternoon for her. We called a couple plays to her and put a couple in the hole. It’s a testament to how hard she’s worked the last four years,” Cornelius said. “She’s been a great teammate, player and person for me for the past four years.”
The win was the second of the season for the team.
Guernsey grabbed a 3-1 advantage off an old-fashioned 3-point play two minutes into the contest, but the rest of the game belonged to the Lady Doggers.
“We didn’t start out so hot. That’s okay. The girls kept their heads down. We really didn’t start rolling like we should have been rolling until after halftime. The girls slowed down a bit, gained some confidence and took it right to them,” Cornelius said. “Our girls played expectational defense in the second half and our defense leads to offense.”
Lingle scored the next 10 points before the visitors found the bottom of the net again late in the opening quarter.
L-FL went on a 12-0 run before Guernsey netted its only points of the second quarter.
Lingle’s lead continued to grow throughout the second half, finally reaching 40 with 5:16 remaining in the game.
Over the final minutes of the game, neither team scored again.
In addition to the 15 points from Rafferty, Speckner added nine, while Hill and sophomore Madison Saul tossed in seven apiece.
The Lady Doggers (2-4) travel to Lusk to face Niobrara County (3-3) at 5:30 p.m.
“We are about to head into our SEWAC schedule,” Cornelius said. “We hope shake things up, but we have a real competitive rest of the season ahead of us.”
