After Goodhue survived a rugged regular season playing against larger schools in the Hiawatha Valley Conference, the Class 1A state tournament offers little that the Wildcats haven’t seen before.

The defending state champions (27-4) rolled over Cromwell-Wright, using a seemingly endless supply of exceptional athletes to pressure the perimeter and shut down Cromwell’s vaunted three-point shooting game.

The Cardinals (26-5), who had made 13 of 25 three-point attempts in the quarterfinals, made just six of 30 on Friday at Williams Arena.

Live by the long ball, die by the long ball.

“All five playoff games before this, we shot between 45 and 55-percent from behind the arc,” Cromwell coach Jeff Gronner said. “In the first half, we hit two of 17. We were shooting at such a high level, then we come here and boom.”

Goodhue coach Josh Wieme said the reason was his team’s ability to harass their shooters.

“I feel it was us,” Wieme said. “Our kids we flying around the floor. They knew they had a lot of ground to cover around that arc and they did a wonderful job of it.”

The Wildcats’ offense did what it had all season — race up and down the court and wear down the opponent. The Cromwell players agreed that it was the one game in which they were not the fastest team on the floor.

“We’re not used to that,” guard Chelsea Swatek said.

Center Sydney Lodermeier, Goodhue’s physical presence inside, said the Wildcats show no fear at this time of year, the result of the night-to-night grind in their conference,

“I credit our conference,” she said. “We play all these very competitive teams in big situations. We play in games and scenarios all season that are prepping us for things like this. At this point, we’re comfortable being on the spot.”

Goodhue withstood Cromwell-Wright’s bombs away approach and got 21 points from senior guard Maddy Miller to advance to the Class 1A championship game for the second consecutive year with a 68-48 victory over the Cardinals.

Shooting three-pointers is Cromwell-Wright’s game, but the Cardinals had a hard time finding the range Friday at Williams Arena, making just six of 30 attempts.

Goodhue, the defending Class 1A champs, will face Mountain Iron-Buhl in Saturday’s championship game. Mountain Iron-Buhl won an early-season meeting between two teams 78-34.

Check back later for more on the game.