When Plattsburg (15-12) scored a fast break layup with 6:12 remaining to take its first lead since the opening minutes of the contest, the North Platte girls’ basketball team (18-9) was unable to respond and fell 51-39 in the district semifinals on Feb. 22.
After Jaylin Burgess swished her second 3-pointer from the right wing to put North Platte up 6-4 midway through the opening frame, the Panthers controlled the lead for the next 22:01 of action. Burgess scored eight of North Platte’s 23 first half points – while Gracie Ramsey had 11 points - when the Panthers took a 4-point lead heading into the locker room.
North Platte’s sole senior Gracie Ramsey, above, scored a team-high 17 points in the Lady Panthers last game of the season when they fell 51-39 to Plattsburg in the Class 2 District 15 Semifinals at Gallatin High School on Feb. 22
“Jaylin did a good job shooting the ball – and Gracie had 17 points too – so they both had good games,” North Platte Head Coach Karl Matt said. “They took away a lot of our inside game and we didn’t get enough scoring from other places, so it just didn’t work out for us.”
After a third quarter that saw the Tigers and Panthers matching baskets, North Platte took a 32-28 margin entering the final period. Plattsburg scored the first eight points of the fourth quarter until Ramsey ended the drought and scored a layup three minutes in.
“We made some shots and when we stopped making shots, we had to come out of what we were playing defensively: we were playing the diamond and one then once we got behind, we had to come out of that and it didn’t go very good defensively when we had to do something different,” Matt said.
After a pair of layups by the Tigers, Ramsey converted on two free throws with 3:11 remaining and Plattsburg responded with six unanswered points on three consecutive trips to the charity stripe. A made shot from behind the arc by North Platte freshman Brianna DeBord with 1:23 left was the Panthers’ final points of the night – and season.
“We just turned the ball over and didn’t make shots, but we were still trying hard. That is one of those things that we’ve run into at times throughout the year, at times we can look really good but then we have stretches where we just can’t make a shot and that’s kind of what happened in the fourth quarter,” Matt said.
While the top-seeded Panthers lost their first game of the Class 2 District 15 Tournament, they had one of their most successful seasons in recent memory. Ramsey was the only North Platte senior ahead of its postseason contest as the Panthers will have a large set of returners next season.
“We had a good year; we had 18 wins and we wanted to win a lot more than that. We thought we’d have a good chance to win the district and the conference, but it just didn’t work out and that’s just the way it goes; we have a lot of players coming back next year so we should still be pretty solid, we just need to get better,” Matt said.