LINCOLN, Neb.—Stacey Beller and Vitoria Wiese scored 10 points apiece and Lindsay Holy Family hung on to beat previously unbeaten Wynot 40-37 Saturday in the Class D2 girls state championship game.
Wynot committed four turnovers in a row after Holy Family (22-2) tied it 37-37 with 1:52 left.
Because the Bulldogs missed four free throws in the last 27 seconds, the Wynot had a chance to tie at the end. But Shelby Wiesler missed a 3-pointer from the corner and the Bulldogs’ Andrea Weeder rebounded, clutching the ball tightly as time ran out.
Sarah Schulte scored 17 points to lead Wynot (25-1).
Winning a state title smoothed out a rough ride through the championship game for Holy Family, which was making its first appearance in Lincoln since 1998.
The Bulldogs committed 28 turnovers and missed six of their last 10 free throws a night after giving the ball away 27 times in a 38-34 semifinal win over Lawrence-Nelson.
“This is the way we do it,” Holy Family coach Travis Friesen said. “We’re not the best shooting team, we’re not the best free-throw shooting team and we turn the ball over.
“But we work on defense a lot. We work on it, work on it, work on it. Holding a very good Wynot team to 37 points is a credit to that defense.”
Wynot shot 27.5 percent—a figure caused in large part by its 1-for-15 3-point shooting—and committed 26 turnovers.
The Blue Devils’ Sarah Schulte finished her 1,000-point career with 17. Eight of her points came in the third quarter, when Wynot erased a 20-17 halftime deficit and went ahead 29-24 before the Bulldogs rallied.
“We needed to keep it going a little longer,” Wynot coach Steve Wieseler said.
