AUSTIN — For the third time this season the New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva girls’ basketball team had to take the court against a strong, veteran Blooming Prairie squad and for the third time came out on top with their best showing yet winning 56-50.

As the two teams met to play in the Austin High School gymnasium on Friday, each team knew exactly what it was going to have to do to stay alive in the postseason. Win and go on or lose and go home.

The Blossoms (20-6 overall) are coming off a win against a Kasson-Mantorville team that they had to play twice in a week and a half winning the first by 20 points but struggled to put away the Komets in the second matchup. The Panthers (25-1) finished the regular season losing one game all season and came off a solid win over Triton winning 53-40 this past Tuesday night.

As the two teams came out to play in the Class 2A-Section 2 play-off game on Friday, the intensity that comes with a play-off game by two very good teams was most definitely in the air as both teams had a great showing of fans that showed that they were there ready, willing and able to show their support.

The first half was a battle back and forth with the Blossoms owning a 6-point lead at one point and as head coach Mindy Sparby of NRHEG called a needed timeout. It seemed that with only two minutes left to play in the half that the Awesome Blossoms might take the momentum that they had built and go into the break with a nice lead. Sparby and her Panthers would have no part of that as they came back in from the timeout and immediately took over. At the half the Panthers held a 3-point lead 33-30.

The Blossoms knew that they were going to have to continue to hold sophomore Allysa Kerkhoff down in points and keep her from grabbing the valuable turnovers she has created this season in the form of steals. As the second half resumed, the Panthers were not going to allow the Blossoms back into this one anytime soon. By the time the second half was under the 10-minute mark, the Panthers had grabbed an 11-point lead and the Blossoms were tallying up some numbers but not in the column that mattered.

Two of the Blossoms shooters were getting into foul trouble and it didn’t help their cause by allowing a very good Panther squad to go to foul line to hit a high percentage shot. At the 8-minute mark, it looked as if the crowd began to lose hope as the place became quiet. But the Panthers’ work was still cut out for them as the Blossoms had one good run left. The Blossoms ran off 8 straight points to close the gap to within three before time was called.

NRHEG finally got back into some scoring as Kelsey Christianson went to the foul line and hit to very important buckets.

“We knew that some of us had to really be ready to step up tonight,” Christianson said. “We knew that they were going to come out and try to shut down Kerkhoff.”

Christianson felt that with so much pressure on Kerkhoff coming into the game that their attitude as a team would really have to be right against the Blossoms.

“We knew that we had to be strong and stay positive tonight,” Christianson said. “Mentally we knew we couldn’t let down but we had to just keep driving the ball at the ones that were in foul trouble.”

Although none of the Blossoms fouled out in the game, it became evident that they had pushed themselves into a depleted state as they tried to finish the game strong themselves only to watch the Panthers extend their lead at the end to win their 25th game of the season and most importantly to win to go on to play another day.

“It was a hard-fought battle tonight between two really great teams,” Sparby said. “Blooming Prairie is a real class act and both teams played their tails off tonight.”

NRHEG will now go on to play Hayfield as they beat Kenyon-Wanamingo 45-37 in the second game of the night in Austin.

NRHEG 56 BP 50

BP scoring: Lynnae Nelson, 18; Kassie Lueth, 14; Marie Morem, 8; Erica Manske, 4; Ashley Hueman, 4; Resha Koster, 4; free throws: 67 percent (8-for-12); rebounds: 31 (Lueth, 9); turnovers: 23 

NRHEG scoring: Alyssa Hagen, 16; Alyssa Kerkhoff, 13; Kelsey Christensen, 10; Jenna Brekke, 7; Anna Schlaak, 5; Kate Quam, 5; free throws: 52 percent (17-for-33); rebounds: 28 (Schlaak, 9); turnovers: 14