The Cascade Lady Champions came back to secure the season sweep, 45-42, in Friday's non-district matchup on the road over the Santa Fe Lady Cats.
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The Cascade Lady Champions won their third-consecutive game on Friday night, spoiling homecoming for the Santa Fe Lady Wildcats in a 45-42 thriller.
Cascade won the first matchup at home, 52-26, back on November 27, but since that loss, the Lady Cats picked up six of their eight overall wins this year heading into Friday night’s matchup. Consequently, the hosts came into Friday playing much better basketball, and head coach Janie Demonbreum’s Lady Champs had to dig deep to pull out the win in the final four minutes of the game.
Sophomore star Kaegan Young, after eclipsing 500 career points in Tuesday’s win at Forrest, led the Lady Champs with three steals and a game-high 24 points, including 20 in the second half, and co-star Sophie Ray put in 12 points of her own along with eight boards. Suzanna Crews added seven points as well.
The much-improved Santa Fe squad saw three scorers reach double-figures with Chaslyn Stewart, Nora-Kate Butt, and Lilly Dodge scoring 15, 11, and 10 points respectively.
The hosts came out with a very methodical offensive approach against the Cascade zone defense, and actually closed the first quarter with a slim 11-9 lead.
The Lady Cats would maintain their two-point advantage going into the halftime locker room as well at 19-17, holding Kaegan Young to just four points and effectively slowing down the Lady Champs’ offensive attack. Sophie Ray was the lone offensive bright spot for Cascade, ending the first half with eight points to keep her team on pace.
Coming out of the locker room to start the third quarter, Young would begin to take over for the visitors, getting to the free throw line seemingly at will in the second half. She finished 11/14 from the charity stripe for the game, and she helped lead the Lady Champs to a 33-29 lead going into the final frame.
However, Cascade would go cold to start the fourth quarter as they were held scoreless for the first four minutes as Santa Fe came back to tie the game at 33. Nonetheless, Young would resume her second half barrage to guide the Lady Champs to a 43-42 lead with less than five seconds left in the game.
Clinging to a one-point lead, Young would get fouled and calmly knock down a pair of free throws to extend the lead to 45-42. With 4.4 seconds left on the clock, Santa Fe was unable to get off a clean look at the buzzer, and Cascade would hold on for the non-district road victory.
Santa Fe falls to 8-14 (1-5) and will resume district play at home against Hampshire on Tuesday.
Cascade improves to 10-13 (3-3) on the year, marking the first time since 2018-19 that the Lady Champs have won double-digit games in a season. They are set to return home for Senior Night on Tuesday against district opponent Grundy County, LIVE on WZNG The Zinger 100.9 and AM 1400 starting at 5:45 p.m.
