Lady Panthers end regular season with 23-point victory over Hollister

The Mountain Grove Lady Panthers’ basketball team entered this week’s Class 4, District 10 Tournament after winning five of their final six regular season contests. Their last win coming in Hollister as they held the Lady Tigers to nine points or less in the first two quarters of a 69-46 victory.
It was a close 13-9 game early as Kaylee Virtue led her team with a pair of 3-poitners for six points.
Six different Lady Panthers scored in a 17-point second quarter as Stella Benson hit a pair of 3-pointers and scored eight points.
Mountain Grove led 30-17 entering halftime before Sadie Schober took over the contest in the third quarter. She scored 13 of her team’s 19 points while Benson added another pair of 3-pointers to extend the lead to 17.
Benson hit her fifth 3-pointer of the game in the final eight minutes and scored seven more points as Mountain Grove pulled away for the 23-point win.
Benson and Schober both scored a team-high 23 points; Virtue hit three, 3-pointers for 11 points; while Cassidy Behrendsen, Hadley Driskill, Bella Garner, Briley White, Leah Broome and Marl Melton each scored two points. Just after press time, the Lady Panthers took on Buffalo on March 2. A win means they play Strafford at 6 p.m. on March 4. Two wins would give them a district championship game against either host Logan-Rogersville or Bolivar at 6 p.m. on March 6.