Madison, SD – The #14 Lady Firestorm traveled to South Dakota for the opening round of the NAIA Tournament Championship, and ran into a buzz saw in the Governors State Jaguars who jumped out to a big early lead and never looked back.
 
Governors State opened the game with a three pointer which was quickly responded to by a Emily Till jump shot.  A minute later Governors State scored again, before both teams entered a three-minute drought in which both teams seemed to be preparing for a long, drawn-out battle.  
 
But coming out of the first media time out the Jaguars scored to end their drought, and while the Firestorm went another three minutes without scoring a basket, the Jaguars would tag on seventeen more points to take a twenty-point lead. The Firestorm finally found the basket with two free throws from Graciela Roybal, but by that point the damage had been done.  At quarters end the Jaguars led 26-6, and the Lady Firestorm was unable to get any closer the rest of the game.
 
A bright spot for the Lady Firestorm was the return from injury of Shaylynn De Yager who would lead the team in scoring with 13 points.  And as she has done all season long, Till led the team in rebounding by pulling down 11 rebounds.
 
Thoughts from Head Coach Rusty Rogers
"Obviously a very disappointing result tonight.  Governors State is a very experienced and talented team.  We knew going in that we would have to perform well on both ends of the floor and in the first half we couldn't put the ball in the basket or stop them on our defensive end.  We built such a huge hole it was difficult to recover.  Very proud of how hard we played in the second half.  It was a great season!"
 
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