By Lana Swanson
The Twin Valley Conference tournament began for the Lady Mustangs on Monday, January 29th in Deshler. Silver Lake went into the tournament as the 3rd seed. For the first matchup of the tournament, the Mustangs took on the number 6 seed, the Lawrence Nelson Raiders. The Lady Mustangs knew that this would be a tough game because they had just previously played the Raiders on Friday the 26th. Friday’s game had a final score of 40 to 29 with Silver Lake winning by 11. Silver Lake had to fight through the entire game to stay ahead of Lawrence Nelson. Their hard work paid off and they ended up with the win. The final score was 37 to 26. Sophie Schmidt led the team with 10 points.
For the second game of the tournament, Silver Lake played the Blue Hill Bobcats. Earlier on in the season, the Mustangs played the Bobcats in a close match that ended with Silver Lake getting the win with a final score of 43 to 41. The Mustangs knew that this would be a tough game. To start off the game, Silver Lake struggled to score in the first quarter, as the Bobcats outscored the Mustangs 10 to 2. The Lady Mustangs gave everything they had and ended up outscoring Blue Hill 13 to 7 in the second quarter. In the second half, Silver Lake fought until the end, but they fell short. The final score of the game was 34 to 32. Junior Katy Soucek led the team in total rebounds with 12.
Due to the loss against Blue Hill, the Lady Mustangs played in the 3rd and 4th place game on Saturday against the Kenesaw Blue Devils at Adams Central High School. Senior Morgan Dinkler explained, “After losing to Blue Hill, we just had to move on and focus on the matchup against Kenesaw to play our game.” When the Mustangs played the Blue Devils earlier on in the season, the Blue Devils won. That being said, Silver Lake knew they had to bring everything they had into this match to come out with a 3rd place win. At the end of the first half, the Mustangs had a 9-point lead. Kenesaw didn’t go down without a fight though, as they outscored Silver Lake by 8 points in the second half. The Mustangs didn’t let up though, and they gave all of their effort until the last second. Their hard work paid off, and they ended up with a final score of 31 to 30 over Kenesaw. Junior Paige Faimon led the Mustangs in points with 10. The Lady Mustangs finished with a 3rd place trophy in the Twin Valley Conference tournament.