Roundup: Chieftains, Bobcats tune up for tourney with wins

Published 9:23 am Sunday, March 3, 2024

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LAWTON — The 2023-24 girls basketball regular season came to an end Thursday night.

Dowagiac and Brandywine both tuned. up for this week’s postseason with wins over Lawton and St. Joseph.

 

Dowagiac at Lawton

Another big scoring night for Southwestern Michigan College-bound Maggie Weller helped the Chieftains finish the regular season with a 53-46 win over Lawton.

Weller scored a game-high 23 points for the Chieftains, who end the regular season with a 14-7 overall record.

Dowagiac outscored the Blue Devils 19-8 in the opening quarter and 27-20 at halftime.

Lawton (14-8) continued it rally in the third quarter as it cut the Chieftains’ lead to 35-33 with eight minutes remaining.

Dowagiac outscored Lawton 18-13 in the fourth quarter to hold on for the victory.

Beside Weller, the Chieftains got nine points from Rebecca Guernsey and Marlie Carpenter.

“It was nice to end the regular season on a winning note, but it was not clean on the defensive end,” said Dowagiac Coach Jason Turner. “If we want to make a run in the postseason we need to be better on the defensive end so that will be our focus. It was nice to see Rebecca knock down some threes for us tonight. Maggie had another great night offensively for us. It’s now time for the best time of the year — postseason basketball!”

Kylee Somers led the Blue Devils with 14 points. Mckenzee Terpstra added 13 points.

Dowagiac will open up Division 2 District Tournament play Monday night against Benton Harbor. The Chieftains are the district host. Tipoff is set for 5:30 p.m.

 

St. Joseph at Brandywine

The top-ranked Bobcats finish the regular season with a 58-29 win over the Bears.

The outcome of the contest was decided by halftime a Brandywine (20-1) led 40-10. The Bobcats led 52-18 heading into the final quarter. Most of the second half was played with a running clock.

Miley Young led a trio of Bobcats in double figures with 14 points. Ellie Knapp and Kadece Brummitt both finished with 11 points.

Tess Kapelke and Ava Rommel both had 10 points for St. Joseph, which finishes the regular season with a 5-15 record.

Brandywine is hosting the Division 3 District Tournament, which starts Monday.

The Bobcats will play Wednesday night against the winner of Monday’s White Pigeon-Buchanan contest. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.