Photo gallery: Class 2A championship game
That final step was a doozy, but Sauk Centre finally climbed it, holding off a late charge by Roseau to defeat the Rams 63-52 in the Class 2A championship game.
It’s the first state title for the Mainstreeters, one that took seven previous state tournament appearances and three runner-up finishes to complete.
“It’s really difficult to get here and once you’re here, it’s 10 times tougher to win it,” Sauk Centre head coach Scott Bergman said. “In the times we finished second, I felt like we got beat by a better team. I think that this proves, in our class, that we’re the best team.”
Sauk Centre completed a perfect season (33-0), the second straight year that the 2A champion finished undefeat. In 2017, it was Roseau who ran the table, beating Sauk Centre in the finals.
The Mainstreeters flipped that result Saturday, but they had to endure some tense moments to do so. Attacking the lane, either for inside baskets or kicking the ball out for three-pointers, Sauk Centre controlled play for most of the first half. They led by 12, 33-21, at halftime and extended that lead to21 points, 49-28, in the first six minutes of the second half.
Roseau was coming off an emotional come-from-behind victory in Friday’s late Class 2A semifinal. That may have played a part in the Rams’ inability to keep pace.
“We didn’t come out with the energy we needed to compete with them for a whole game,” Roseau coach Kelsey Didrikson said.
The Rams tried to make uip for it in the game’s final 11 minutes. Realizing the game was slipping away, they began pressuring the Sauk Centre ball-handlers. Turnovers ensued and Roseau, a team that had trailed in every game of the state tournament, began to turn those miscues into points. When Emma Waling dropped in her third three-pointer of the second half with 2:06 left, the Sauk Centre lead had dwindled to just three points, 55-52.
“No lead is safe with them,” Bergman said.
Sauk Centre was able to hold off Roseau at the free throw line. The Mainstreeters converted 8-of-11 free throws in the final two minutes, the final four by senior Maesyn Thiesen.
The Peschel sisters, Kelsey, a senior, and Tori, a sophomore, paced Sauk Centre with 18 points apiece and Thiesen, a senior Miss Basketball finalist, added 17.
“It hasn’t set in yet, but it’s very exciting to get to end [my] high school career like this,” Thiesen said.