BISMARCK - The Class A frontcourt was too much for the Class B team to overcome at the Lions All-Star girls basketball game Tuesday.
Class A coach Greg Amundson started two centers, Century's Whitney Ledger and Mandan's Rebecca Kielpinski, against the smaller Class B team and it paid off.
Ledger scored 15 points and grabbed eight rebounds, while Kielpinski put up 12 points and grabbed nine rebounds to lead Class A to a 73-54 victory at the Bismarck Civic Center.
"Five-eight kids are quick, but our kids are bigger and that makes a difference," Amundson said.
Ledger and Kielpinski are used to playing against each other, but welcomed the chance to team up in the same frontcourt.
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"She (Kielpinski) is fun to play with," Ledger said. "You give her the ball and in return she'll give you the ball back."
It wasn't just Ledger and Kielpinski that provided a spark for the Class A frontcourt that outrebounded Class B 59-29.
Bismarck's Kate Muggerud and Valley City's Brittni Bruenjes each grabbed 10 rebounds, while Fargo South's Joslynn Tharaldson scored 10 points.
Class B hung with Class A for the first half, trailing just 36-31 at the break. But Class A put together a 15-0 run midway through the second half to put the game away.
"They did a lot better job of getting it inside the last four minutes of the first half and during the second half," Class B coach Gary Schauer of Langdon said.
The Class B team went ice cold during the 15-0 run, going more than seven minutes without scoring.
"We went cold for a while," Schauer said of his team that shot 19-for-75 from the floor. "We got off-balance on some of the shots, but those are shots we normally make."
Minto's Hayley Schanilec was the only Class B player to score in double figures, finishign with a game-high 18 points.
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CLASS B: Kadee Kurtz 1-6 0-0 2, Mallory Sand 2-3 0-0 4, Ashley King 2-9 0-0 4, Whitney Flyberg 1-4 1-2 4, Chris Gullikson 1-8 0-0 2, Anna Weber 2-7 0-0 5, Kayla Barenthsen 3-8 1-1 8, Megan Dockter 0-4 0-0 0, Tessa Fenske 1-3 0-0 2, Hayley Schanilec 4-14 8-8 18, Jaren Mondry 0-1 0-0 0, Desiree Michels 2-8 0-2 5. Totals 19-75 10-13 54.
CLASS A: Jessica Janusz 1-2 1-1 3, Nora Narloch 1-1 0-0 2, Cierra Roebuck 0-4 0-0 0, Mindy Vanderpan 2-8 0-0 4, Brittany Geffre1-5 2-4 4, Ivy Brunner 2-4 2-2 6, Whitney Ledger 5-9 5-7 15, Kate Muggerud 2-7 0-1 4, Joslynn Tharaldson 2-2 6-6 10, Brittni Bruenjes 3-4 1-3 7, Rebecca Kielpinski 6-6 0-0 12, Alyssa Larson 3-5 0-0 6. Totals 28-57 17-24 73.
Halftime: A 36, B 31. 3-pointers: B 6-19 (Schanilec 2, Flyberg 1, Weber 1, Barenthsen 1, Michels 1), A 0-8. Rebounds: B 29 (King 7), A 59 (Muggerud 10, Bruenjes 10). Fouls: B 18, A 15. Fouled out: Geffre. Assists: B 12 (Fenske 3), A 17 (Roebuck 3, Geffre 3, Kielpinski 3). Turnovers: B 15, A 27. Blocked shots: A 1 (Kielpinski 1). Steals: B 17 (Michels 3), A 9 (Janusz 5).
