WORTHINGTON -- The Lady Jays dug themselves into a hole that even a spectacular performance by Sam Lynn couldn't dig them out of in their basketball game on Saturday.
Lynn scored a team-high 21 points in her team's matchup against the Dordt College JV, including 12 in the second half.
However, Minnesota West never held a lead in the game, falling short against the Defenders by a score of 68-61 in their final game of the 7th Annual Sandford Medical Center Worthington Basketball Classic.
Lynn also had a team-high five assists, five rebounds and three steals, and added a block. She played a key role in a second-half rally by the Lady Jays.
After falling behind 29-44 at the beginning of the second half, an 18-6 run had MW back within three.
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The Lady Jays then fell back again by as many as nine points, but again narrowed the deficit to three on a lay-up by Lynn.
"When you get behind it makes you have to work harder," Lynn said. "Every possession becomes more important. The momentum can swing anytime, and in the space of a couple of shots you can be back in it. When you're coming from behind it's tough because you use all your energy to get back in it sometimes."
In the end the Lady Jays were undone by the fact that they registered 25 fouls, allowing the Defenders to score 22 points from the free-throw line, and by their inability to make shots at timely junctures.
"We got back in the game but then we just could not convert a three," head coach Mike Fury said. "We had some pretty good looks. Those two times when we got it to three we just couldn't get closer. It's hard to get over the hump when you're not shooting well. We did shoot 30 percent I see, but it didn't feel like we even shot that good."
Erica Their finished with nine points for MW, including going two-for-five from three-point range, and also added three assists and three rebounds.
Alyson Drooger led the team with three blocks, and she also had four rebounds.
The Lady Jays finished the tournament 1-1 after a big win against Madison Area Technical College on Friday.
"Overall on the weekend when you go 1-1 it's ok," Fury said. "The good news is we get to go back at it. It's early in the season and we have a lot of things to learn.
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"We don't have a lot of back-to-back games, but we've got a couple coming up, so we've got to learn how to play those games, and that's the way this works."
Despite the tough loss on Saturday, Lynn said that the Lady Jays are optimisitc after their first two games of the season.
"We feel really good about where we're at," Lynn said. "We played well as a team, we just need to work on the little things, like crashing the boards and talking more on defense. Overall we've started really strong."
Dordt JV 38 30 -- 68
MN West 27 34 -- 61
Dordt (3FG-2FG-FT-TP) Kooiker 1-5-3-16, Adamson 2-0-5-11, Kelderman 1-1-6-11, Herrema 0-3-0-6, Hulst 0-4-6-14, VanWingerden 0-3-2-8, VanDyk 0-1-0-2. Totals 4-17-22-68.
MW (3FG-2FG-FT-TP) Their 2-1-1-9, VanderVeen 0-2-2-6, Maras 0-2-2-6, Smith 0-2-2-6, Lynn 0-9-3-21, Drooger 0-1-2-4, Wik 0-0-1-1, Schroeder 2-0-0-6, Christensen 0-1-2-4. Totals 4-18-13-61.
