The Blue Earth Area girls basketball team lost a 78-77 thriller when they faced the Jackson County Central Huskies in Jackson on Tuesday, Jan. 6.

The game started with BEA’s Myla Eastman scoring on a drive and hitting a three-pointer to give the Bucs a 5-0 lead.

JCC answered with five points of their own to tie the game and set the tone of how the contest would play out.

BEA turned a 15-11 lead into a 21-11 advantage five minutes into the game on the strength of back-to-back treys by Ella Swanson. The Bucs’ biggest lead of the game came with 10 and a half minutes left to play in the first half when a basket from outside the arc by Lola Lundquist gave the Maroon and Gold a 29-16 lead.

The Huskies began to cut away at the Bucs’ lead and tied the game at 39-39 when Paige Benda scored her only points of the night, a three-pointer right before halftime.

JCC struck first in the second half and built a six-point lead at 53-47.

A three-pointer by Emersen Weir cut the Huskies’ lead in half. Weir then converted a fastbreak into two more points to reduce JCC’s lead to 53-52.

A trey by Lundquist, a basket off an offensive rebound by Madelyn Humburg and a pair of made free throws by Eastman propelled the Bucs to a 59-53 lead with 10:30 left to play in the game.

The lead changed again when the Huskies made two free throws to take a 67-66 lead over the Bucs. It was a lead they would not surrender.

JCC had a six-point lead at 76-70 when a trey by Eastman brought the Bucs to within three points of the Huskies. After the host team sank a free throw to lead 77-73, Lundquist sank a basket from behind the arc to cut JCC’s lead to 77-76 with just over two minutes remaining to the final buzzer.

Each team scored only one point in the final minutes of play and the Huskies held on for a 78-77 victory.

A couple of things stand out when looking at the statistics. The first is that JCC went to the free throw line a total of 36 times and made 22 of their attempts from the charity stripe. BEA shot 19 free throws and made 13.

The Huskies also held a big edge in rebounds. They finished with a total of 63 rebounds compared to 33 for the Bucs.

JCC’s advantage on the boards led them to score 27 second-chance points and 36 points in the paint.

The Bucs made the most of their shots. They were 11-for-27 (40.7 percent) from inside the arc while making 14 of their 36 (38.9 percent) shots from outside the arc.

JCC was 19-for-57 (33.3 percent) from two-point range and 6-for-19 (31.6 percent) from three-point range.

BEA committed 11 turnovers to 14 for JCC.

Four Bucs reached double digits in scoring led by Lundquist with 27 points. Eastman finished with 24 points, Swanson with 13 and Weir with 10.

Eastman led BEA with eight rebounds and Humburg had seven.

Swanson had five assists followed by Weir and Lundquist with three each.

After going on the road to face Redwood Valley on Friday, Jan. 9, BEA will travel to Windom to battle the Eagles on Tuesday, Jan. 13.