Mounder girls win regional crown, felled by Blackhawks in sectional semifinal

By Cara L. Dempski

It took 13 years, but there is finally another girls’ regional basketball championship plaque in the Elk Mound trophy cases.

The Mounders, who had a first-round bye in regional play, were forced to wait an extra day to meet the Arcadia Raiders, whom they beat on February 25 in the semifinals. 

That victory earned Elk Mound homecourt advantage against sixth-seeded Westby, an upset winner over West Salem, for the Division 3 regional championship a week ago Monday. The Norsemen showed up for most of the first half against the Lady Mounders on February 27 before falling away to a 43-23 final that pushed the Mounders into sectional play for the first time since the 2004.

Elk Mound headed to Osseo-Fairchild High School Thursday, March 2 for its second meeting with the Bloomer Blackhawks this season. The Mounders struggled to put together a good offense in the first half, but managed to iron out the kinks well enough to lead by one at the half. 

After racing out of the gate in the second and holding at least a five-point lead until the final six minutes, the Mounders succumbed to the Blackhawks 54-49 in overtime. The pair’s previous contest, played back in mid-January at Elk Mound, also went into overtime with the Mounders winning that one 51-48.

The sectional loss marked the end of Elk Mound’s season, and served as the final game for seniors Kaitlyn Baier, Elizabeth Fasbender, Megan Krall, Kami King, Riley Radtke and Gracie Peterson. Head coach Jordan Kongshaug said the players will be missed.

Westby

The first rule of any game is you have to score in order to win. In basketball, you have to make baskets to score. In order to make baskets, you have to be relaxed.

The Elk Mound squad looked tense when it stepped onto its home court for its February 27 regional final against Westby. It showed in the Mounders’ first-half, as the team seemed to have difficulty finding scoring opportunities. 

Elk Mound led 17-13 when they went to the locker room for the halftime break, and came back out 10 minutes later looking like an entirely different team.

The Mounders chalked up another 26 points in the second half while keeping Westby’s NCAA Division 1 recruit Chelsea Olson in check to give the school its first regional championship in over a decade with a 43-23 win.

Head coach Jordan Kongshaug acknowledged emotions were high going into the game. 

“When you’re playing the regional championship, you’re a little tense,” the coach explained. “When the ball doesn’t go in at first, you stress a little bit.”

The first basket of the game belonged to Olson. The Norsemen senior dropped in a three-point shot from near the top of the key at 15:40, which was answered in kind by Elk Mound when Elizabeth Fasbender dropped in a three-pointer 60 seconds later.

The Mounders pushed out to a 13-5 lead with 9:41 to go in the opening half, but then the Norsemen clawed their way back to within four just before the half.

Westby tried to turn the tide in the opening seconds of the second half with a two-point field goal from junior Kenzie VonRuden, but Mounder Morgan Radtke picked up two on a lay-up and drew the foul. Radtke tacked on one more point with her ensuing charity shot, and Elk Mound led 20-15 with 17:18 left to play.

Olson fired in two for the Norsemen to narrow the scoring gap to 20-17, but Elk Mound junior Allie Weber drilled three to give the Mounders a six-point edge over Westby. From that point on, the Mounders slowly inched away from the Norsemen, who could not seem to find the bottom of the net in the final nine minutes of the game.

Kongshaug expressed pride in his team’s defensive effort.

“We had a plan, and we executed,” he said after the game. 

Offensively, Weber led the team with four three-pointers and a pair of free shots for 14 points. Fasbender picked up 12 points of her own with a pair each of twos, threes, and charity throws. Sophomore post player and the game’s utility player, Morgan Radtke, earned nine points. 

Kami King shot for four, and Hannah Cedarblade and Kaitlyn Baier tied with two points each.

Westby’s highest-scoring player was VonRuden, who picked up 10 points in the game.

WESTBY 23, ELK MOUND 43
Westby………………………………………13  10 — 23
Elk Mound………………………………….17  26 — 43

TEAM STATISTICS (FG-FT-F-T)

Westby (7-4-5-23) L. Crume 0-0-2-0, K. VonRuden 5-0-1-10, C. Olson 1-2-2-7, M. DelMedico 1-2-0-4, M. Manske 0-2-0-2.

Elk Mound (10-5-10-43) H. Cedarblade 1-0-1-2, A. Weber 0-2-3-14, E. Fasbender 2-2-2-12, K. King 2-0-1-4, M. Radtke 4-1-2-9, K. Baier 1-0-0-2, C. Sweeney 0-0-1-0.

THREE-POINTERS W — C. Olson 1; EM — A. Weber 4, E. Fasbender 2.

Bloomer

Where was Elk Mound’s press?

It was the question on everyone’s mind in the sectional semi-final at Osseo-Fairchild on March 2. Why was Elk Mound not pressing?

“We looked at what we had from a personnel standpoint, and that’s the route we went,” head coach Jordan Kongshaug said of the Mounders’ defense against Bloomer. “We didn’t press the last time we played them.”

To be fair, not pressing worked during the Elk Mound’s January 14 win over the Blackhawks. The sectional contest mirrored the prior game in several ways: the Mounders took a lead into halftime, were outscored in the second, and were forced into overtime by Bloomer.

The big difference this time? Elk Mound struggled to find good shots in the final four minutes, leading to a 54-49 victory for the Blackhawks, and a trip to the sectional final against Somerset.

The loss left Kongshaug with some questions regarding the game plan, ones he admitted might not have swayed the final outcome.

“It could have gone the other way too,” the Mounder coach said. “When you lose a game in overtime, you’re going to second-guess everything.”

Elk Mound got off to a slow start, not earning its first score until nearly three minutes into the opening half. Then, sophomore Morgan Radtke gave the Mounders two points on a fast break to the glass. She drew a foul on the way up to earn another point and give Elk Mound a 3-2 lead.

Radtke struck again nearly two minutes later to lift the Mounders to 5-2, but committed a foul against Bloomer’s Danelle Score on a three-point attempt less than 20 seconds after. Score hit only one of her three charity throws, but put the Blackhawks within spitting distance of the lead with a score of 8-6. 

The Blackhawks drew even with the Mounders on a pair of free throws from Sierra Raine after she drew a foul from junior Allie Weber. They took over the lead when Weber subsequently fouled Chandler Zwiefelhofer and Madysen Borofka committed a foul against Shaina Zwiefelhofer. Both Zwiefelhofers hit their shots from the line, making the score 12-8 in favor of Bloomer.

The Hawks extended their lead to 18-10 with 7:08 left to go before halftime, but Elk Mound started finding good shots again. Kami King drained an outside shot for three to make the score 18-13, and Elizabeth Fasbender picked up two more to make it 18-15, but Bloomer’s Kyra Arendt hit a field goal to raise the score to 20-15.

The Mounders kept playing their game, and chipped away at the lead. King drew a foul at the two-minute mark and felled one of her two shots to make the score 22-20. The last two minutes dripped steadily away toward halftime, when Fasbender found herself holding the ball with less than two seconds before the break.

She did not hesitate to put up an arching shot from outside the arc that rattled around the rim a couple times before dropping through as the horn sounded. The shot sent the Mounders to the locker room with a 23-22 lead.

Despite opening the second half with an 11-point run, the Mounders could not keep the Blackhawks from closing the gap in the final nine minutes of regulation. The horn sounded on a 47-47 score to give both teams another four minutes to settle the matter.

Fasbender started the overtime period by giving Elk Mound a two-point lead at the 3:15 mark, but Blackhawk Aliya Seibel responded with three to give the Bloomer girls’ their first lead in nearly 20 minutes, 50-49. Try as they might, the Mounders were not able to get shots to fall after Fasbender’s fast start, and sent the Hawks to the line multiple times to end the game on the bottom end of a 54-49 effort.

Kongshaug and his team were, understandably, saddened by the loss. Still, the Elk Mound coach had some good things to say about his team.

“It was a great high school basketball game,” Kongshaug stated. “Obviously we had a really, really successful season. I’m really proud of these kids, they’re a great group to coach.”

Fasbender led the Mounders’ effort with 15 points, King scored 12 and Weber picked up 11. Radtke contributed nine more points, and Baier landed two.

Bloomer’s Sierra Raine and Aliya Seibel scored 15 points each to lead their team and tie with Fasbender as the game’s highest-scoring players.

The Dunn-St. Croix champions ended their 2016 – 2017 season with an overall record of 20-5.

BLOOMER 54, ELK MOUND 49
Bloomer…………………………………22  25  9 — 54
Elk Mound……………………………..23  27  2 — 49

TEAM STATISTICS (FG-FT-F-T)

Bloomer (17-11-18-54) J. Burgess 1-0-3-2, A. Seibel 5-2-4-15, C. Zwiefelhofer 3-3-2-12, K. Arendt 2-0-0-4, S. Raine 5-3-2-15, S. Zwiefelhofer 0-2-3-2, S. Kostner 1-0-3-2, D. Score 0-1-1-4.

Elk Mound (11-9-16-49) H. Cedarblade 0-0-2-0, A. Weber 1-0-5-11, E. Fasbender 3-6-1-15, K. King 2-2-1-12, M. Radtke 4-1-4-9, K. Baier 1-0-2-2, M. Borofka 0-0-1-0.

THREE-POINTERS B — A. Seibel 1, D. Score 1, C. Zwiefelhofer 1; EM — A. Weber 3, E. Fasbender 1, K. King 2.