Tipton girls fall to East Buchanan in title game

Myra Claas of Tipton is defended by Dawn Potter of East Buchanan near the baseline during Saturday afternoon's Class 2 state championship game at JQH Arena in Springfield.
Myra Claas of Tipton is defended by Dawn Potter of East Buchanan near the baseline during Saturday afternoon's Class 2 state championship game at JQH Arena in Springfield.

SPRINGFIELD - The Tipton Lady Cardinals had to fill the lane with as many players as possible. They did that.

They still couldn't stop East Buchanan's duo of Gracie Kelsey and Addisyn Ishmael.

Kelsey had 26 points and 12 rebounds while Ishmael burned Tipton for 21 points as they led the Bulldogs to a 62-51 win Saturday afternoon at JQH Arena for the program's first state championship.

With a runner-up finish, Tipton earned its first state trophy in girls basketball.

"Like I told them, it's the only second place trophy that I'm proud of," Tipton coach Jason Culpepper said.

It wasn't always easy for the Bulldogs to score inside, with the Lady Cardinals sending two or three defenders near the basket and the 6-foot-1 Kelsey picking up her second foul early in the second quarter. But she didn't commit a foul the rest of the game and 5-8 senior Ishmael was always there to capitalize when Tipton surrounded Kelsey.

"It's tough whenever they watch us play Blue Eye last game and they kind of see who we like to swing away, which is Alexa (Jurgensmeyer)," Culpepper said. "We like to have her be the helper and they did a really good job of every time Alexa was guarding the girl we were going to help off of, they put that girl on the opposite side block.

"So if Alexa helped, that girl knew to throw it to the opposite side block and they got us twice on it."

The game that matched up unranked Tipton (26-6) and second-ranked East Buchanan (29-3) went back and forth for more than two and a half quarters.

Myra Claas, a freshman guard, helped Tipton lead for much of the first half by knocking down 3s and working her way around the Bulldog defense for layups.

Claas scored 14 of Tipton's 18 first-quarter points to build a four-point edge. She drained a pair of 3s in the final minute of the quarter and added a third from the top of the key to give Tipton its largest lead of the contest at 24-16 a minute into the second quarter.

At the half, Claas had 21 points on 7-of-9 shooting and a 4-of-5 clip at the free-throw line, including three to pull Tipton within 33-32 at intermission.

East Buchanan clawed back from its deficit when turnovers and missed shots added up for Tipton during a more than four-minute stretch.

It was defense plus inside baskets that eventually got the Bulldogs' lead to 50-40 at the end of the third quarter.

It was senior Dawn Potter who locked down Claas, who scored two points in the second half to finish with a team-high 23.

"I don't think there's probably a girl on this team that wouldn't say that they didn't want to go up against her defensively," East Buchanan coach Cori Elms said. "A lot of games she's that person that finds a way to get on the ball and makes things happen."

East Buchanan led by as many as 14 twice in the fourth quarter, at 54-40 after an Ishmael layup and at 56-42 on a Kelsey layup.

Tipton managed to cut it to 57-51 when Abby Backes made her fifth and sixth free throws of the game with 1:15 left to finish perfect at the line.

Backes closed out her high school career with a 16-point performance.

East Buchanan then made 5-of-6 at the line to close it out.

"It settled in with about 20 seconds left to go," East Buchanan junior Lillian Schilling said. "Looking at our crowd and watching the time wind down and knowing we just made history."