BEA’s Erika Gaydon (dark jersey) guards against an inbounds pass during a game earlier this season.

The Blue Earth Area girls basketball season came to an end on Tuesday, March 1, when they were defeated 74-22 by the Lake Crystal-Wellcome Memorial Knights in the opening round of the Section 2AA South Sub-section playoffs.

LCWM entered the playoffs with an overall record of 23-4 and the top seed against BEA, who began the evening with a record of 4-20 and was the No. 8-seeded team.

The Knights held a commanding 53-14 lead by halftime before outscoring the Bucs 21-8 in the closing stanza.

BEA scored all of their points on 2-point field goals, making 11 of their 26 attempts. LCWM shot the ball slightly better from 2-point range and made 13 of their 26 shots from inside the arc.

Shots taken from outside the arc would not fall for the Bucs who went 0 for 7 on their 3-point attempts. Meanwhile, the Knights made almost half of their long-range shots, going 12 for 25 on their shots from outside of the arc.

BEA went to the free-throw line four times and missed all of their attempts. LCWM was 12 for 18 from the charity stripe.

When it came to rebounds, the Knights had 28 while the Bucs had 17. BEA committed 22 turnovers to only nine for LCWM.

Maddie Schiltz led the Maroon and Gold in scoring with 10 points. Sophie Keister and Kate Armon each finished with four points. Schiltz and Keister each recorded six rebounds.

With the win the Knights advanced to the next round against Waseca, which was played on March 4.

It was the final game for two senior Buccaneer players, Schiltz and Aubrey Hueper.

Medford 40, BEA 25

Blue Earth Area trailed Medford 16-14 at the half of the non-conference game played on Feb. 24, but could not keep up in the final 18 minutes and eventually fell to the Tigers by a score of 40-25.

Both teams scored 16 points from 2-point field goals. The Bucs were 8 for 20 from inside of the arc compared to the Tigers, who were 8 for 36.

Medford and BEA also had identical results on shots taken from outside of the arc with each team making 3 of 16 long-range attempts.

The difference in scoring came from the free-throw line. Medford went to the charity stripe 23 times and made 15 of their shots while BEA only went to the foul line twice, missing both of their attempts.

Another advantage held by the Tigers was in rebounding where they held a 42-31 edge over the Bucs.

In the turnover department, BEA was charged with 22 miscues while Medford had 13.

Leading scorer for the Bucs was Kate Armon who poured in 17 points from her guard position. Maddie Schiltz and Sophie Keister each tallied four points to account for the rest of BEA’s points.

Schiltz and Keister each had a good night rebounding. Schiltz finished with 12 boards while Keister had nine.

Armon also led the team in assists with three while Schiltz led the team in steals with four.