The Mid-Prairie girl’s basketball team opens up play today at the state basketball tournament.

The Golden Hawks face MOC-Floyd Valley who is ranked second in the state overall, and it also ranked first in the state with the best record, fifth in shooting percentage, fifth in points per game and second in point differential between points scored and allowed with 29 points.

Mid-Prairie is ranked 13th and is only ranked above MOC- Floyd Valley in steals with 373.

Mid-Prairie is shooting 35 percent from the floor and is scoring 48 points per game.

Mariah Swartzentruber leads the way for the Golden Hawks with 250 points and Mallory McArtor with 231 points.

MOC-Floyd Valley is shooting 45 percent from the floor and is scoring 59 points per game.

They are led by Alexis Conway and her 440 points on the year.

Mid-Prairie head coach Mark Pennington said his team needs to get out and play Mid-Prairie ball to keep the game close to give his team a chance to get the win.

“I think the first thing is we need to play our game, we got this far from playing Mid-Prairie basketball which is just scrappy, up and down, defensive struggles, if it’s a game in the 40’s we have a great opportunity, if it gets into the 60’s a 70’s we don’t have a very strong chance, so we have to play our game and people know it is coming, but even then they struggle with it, with the intensity and quickness we have, so we just have to play that style, get on the back boards and the transition,” Pennington said. “We just need to enjoy it, enjoy the moment, and like I told the kids if we can get them into a game in the fourth quarter you have a great chance, because they have not been in many close games.”

This game is at the Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines with a start time of 3:15. This game can be heard on AM and FM KCII and KCIIradio.com under radio plus with pregame at 2:45 and tip-off at 3:15. the one to count on for state playoff basketball is AM and FM KCII and KCIIradio.com.