Eden Prairie girls basketball gets hot in second half, defeats Minnetonka

The Eagles nailed 3-pointers late to get by the conference foe Skippers

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The Eden Prairie Eagles girls’ basketball needed a home win over the Minnetonka Skippers in order to keep pace in the conference after losing at Minnetonka. The Eagles got what they needed, albeit in dramatic fashion, and defeated the Skippers 69-66.

The Eagles might have run away with the game thanks to a slew of Minnetonka turnovers that resulted in extra possessions for the Eagles early in the first half. The Skippers had four turnovers in a matter of minutes, but Eden Prairie went cold from the field, missing seven straight attempts.

Sidney Reed captained the ship for the Skippers in the first, scoring nine points to lead Minnetonka. Ashley Fritz helped weather the storm for the Eagles in the first half, hitting two threes and scoring eight points. 

Tori Schlagel also knocked down two treys and led all scorers in the first half with 10 points. The Eagles, however, were lucky to be down just one at halftime, however.

“We did not shoot well in the first half at all,” Eden Prairie head coach Ellen Wiese said. “We shot 28 percent, and then in the second half I thought we got our legs under us and just got our confidence.”

The shooters for Eagles kept shooting, and when they’re locked in, they can hit shots from anywhere. 

The Eagles rained down a barrage of threes to close what was a 12-point deficit with four minutes, 37 seconds left. Molly Lenz led the charge, hitting two consecutive threes that electrified the home crowd. 

Then, Schlagel added another one in succession, and Annika Anderson got the Eagles back in the game with a fourth consecutive three.

Minnetonka got a lift from Aaliyah Crump thanks to Tootie Cade’s assist to make it 66-59 with 3:47 remaining, but the Eagles locked down defensively to hold the Skippers at 66 points for the next two minutes. 

Crump would finish with 14 points, as would Liesl McCallum. Freshman guard Lanelle Wright had 13 for Minnetonka.

“We were face guarding Aaliyah Crump, and when she posted up, we always had backside help on that skip pass,” Wiese explained. “We were slow at times getting out, but I thought in the last couple of minutes, all of a sudden, we sprinted out there, closed out, and prevented that easy 3-pointer. … I was very proud of the defensive effort.”

The biggest takeaway from this game is that these two teams on a neutral court could require multiple overtime periods to decide. The difference, according to Lenz, was that Eden Prairie had suffered some losses in close conference games recently and made late-game situations a focus in practice.

“Our press worked pretty well at the end, so that helped, too," Lenz said. "I think it was just that we wanted to win so bad that we found a way to make it happen.”

Lenz led all scorers with 19 points and hit three free-throws in the final seconds to make it a three-point game, which it remained.

Here is our gallery from the game:

Minnetonka vs. Eden Prairie

Photos by Jeff Lawler