Photo Courtesy of Nicole Miller (MP Sports Social Media)

The Mid-Prairie Golden Hawk girls basketball team advanced through the opening round of the playoffs Saturday night at Tim Grady Gymnasium in Wellman with a 67-49 win over Prairie City Monroe. The Mustangs led early, using hot shooting from downtown and a pressure defense to force Mid-Prairie turnovers, but the Hawks righted the ship and led 18-14 after the first. The Golden Hawk offense got rolling with a 20 point second frame to take a 38-29 lead into half. After an even third quarter, Mid-Prairie asserted itself late, closing the game on a 17-8 spring that covered the entire fourth frame to put the game away. After the contest, Golden Hawk head coach Danny Hershberger talked about his team’s success and final period run. “We’re usually not the tallest team on the court so we have to do a good job of rebounding and Landry (Pacha) has been huge for us. When we can limit the other team to one shot, and get our offense going pushing it down the court, that’s also been a key for us. When we can get extra possessions, finding ways to get those offensive rebounds and put-backs that’s important. We had some huge second chance opportunities we converted on tonight in the second half to extend our lead. You have to do those things to win these type of games. Take care of the basketball, which we did in the fourth quarter and we did a better job defensively of taking away what they were trying to do and forcing them into tough shots. Great job by our girls down the stretch of stepping up to the line with confidence.”

The Hawks shot 49% as a team, were plus 21 on the glass, pulling in 14 offensive rebounds and had 17 team assists. Kylie Reinier led Mid-Prairie with a team high 14 points in her final game in front of the home crowd. Landry Pacha went double double, with 12 points and 10 boards. Amara Jones chipped in 10 points. With the win, the Golden Hawks improve to 16-6 on the year and advance to the 3A regional semifinals Wednesday at No. 11 Vinton-Shellsburg who was a 67-22 winner over South Tama Saturday. You can hear that game live on AM 1380, FM 102.5 and KCIIradio.com, with a 6:30 Washington HyVee Pregame Show and 7p.m. tip.