PAXTON – Five days prior to losing 36-31 to Bismarck-Henning-Rossville-Alvin on Wednesday, the Paxton-Buckley-Loda varsity girls basketball team experienced its first win of the 2025 season.
Since winning 46-44 over Peoria Christian in the Calvary Turkey Shootout in Normal the previous Friday, PBL had its shootout game in Saturday canceled due to a snowstorm.
Another batch of snow postponed the BHRA game, which was originally scheduled for Monday, Dec. 1.
“I don’t remember the last time it snowed this much this early. I’m glad we got the game rescheduled,” PBL head coach Jeff Sinn said. “It’s been weird. It has kind of worked out in our favor in some ways. I think the rest has helped us in some ways. We kind of had to mentally prepare for that.”
Meanwhile, BHRA (2-3) was less than two weeks removed from finishing fifth in the Timberwolf Tip-Off in Cissna Park and little more than month removed from a 46-37 loss to an undefeated St. Joseph-Ogden team.
“They were in it at the end,” Sinn said. “I was really happy with the way our girls performed tonight. I’m really happy with the way we played the last two games.”
The Panthers (1-4) trailed 35-24 at the end of the third quarter of Wednesday’s game against BHRA before going on a 7-1 run in the fourth quarter.
Audrey McCoy made a free throw with 6:22 left in the game to make it 35-25 before Kylie Rust scored while drawing Alivia Reifsteck’s fourth foul with 5:46 remaining to cut PBL’s deficit to 35-27.
With 2:57 remaining, Hallee Johnson drew Reese LeBeane’s fourth foul before making two free throws to make it 35-29. Fifty-one seconds later, a jump shot by Rust made it 35-31.
“We had them where we needed them in the fourth quarter,” Sinn said. “In the past, that’s a spot where we don’t fight back, but they want to compete and they don’t back down very easily.”
After PBL’s defense recorded a stop, PBL collected multiple rebounds on its ensuing offensive possession, but shots by Johnson, Rust and Emmy Bagwell could not find their way into the basket as BHRA claimed possession of the ball with 50 seconds remaining.
Ella Acton made a free throw to account for the Blue Devils’ lone fourth-quarter point with 11.3 seconds left in the contest. The two teams exchanged turnovers before Rust missed a shot in the final seconds of the game.
“We had a lot of good things defensively that we did tonight,” Sinn said. “We looked at film of what we’ve done in the past. They have two really good post players. I thought we completely took them out of the game. We installed a wrinkle in our defense, and I thought our girls did a great job of executing that wrinkle. The press was good tonight. We got the traps exactly where we wanted the traps.”
After Acton made two free throws and Reifsteck drained a 3-pointer to give the Blue Devils an early 5-0 lead, Rust made a jump shot, McCoy added a basket and Hallee made a free throw to tie the game at 5-5.
The Panthers finished the game making 8-of-15 shots from the charity stripe.
“We’ve got to start somewhere. Now we’re going to put the goal at 60 percent during the game,” Sinn said. “Obviously, if you can hit a few more of those free throws, that puts you in a better position.”
Giana Brown made a go-ahead 3-pointer before an offensive-rebound putback by Gentry Elson made it 10-5.
“We’re getting better rebounding, but we are still giving away second-chance opportunities,” Sinn said.
Johnson made a free throw to make it 10-6 as the first quarter came to an end.
Reifsteck drained a 3-pointer before Johnson made a basket and McCoy made two free throws to make it 13-10 with five minutes left in the second quarter.
Brown and Rust exchanged baskets before Reece Larsen buried a trey and Elson added a basket to make it 20-12.
Rust and Taylor Cole each made a basket to cut the PBL deficit to 20-16 before BHRA ended the first half on a 6-0 run. Acton made two free throws before Elson and Sophia Stines each tallied a basket to make it 26-16 at halftime.
Elson and Stines each made a basket in the third quarter to extend the Blue Devils’ lead to 30-16 with 5:17 remaining in the quarter.
“That kind of forced us to slowly fight back and do some things in the third quarter,” Sinn said. “I was happy with our execution. We’ve just got to cut out some of those lulls like we had in the second quarter.”
Olivia Rehg drained a 3-pointer before Stines made a free throw to make it 31-19. Rust made a basket before Acton and Rust exchanged free throws to make it 32-22 with 3 ½ minutes left in the third quarter.
Cole scored on a Bagwell assist before Acton made a free throw and Shelby Jameson added a basket to make it 35-24.
“They do a great job of guarding. That’s probably the toughest team we’ve faced defensively. Nothing was easy. In the past, our teams struggled with that type of pressure,” Sinn said. “We spent a good 10 minutes last night talking about how to handle pressure and get yourself open so we can get the offense going.”
Rust finished the game with a team-high 13 points while Johnson had six points, McCoy had five points, Cole had four points and Rehg had three points.
Tessa Boehme came off the bench after dealing with a thumb injury, but was left scoreless despite some open shots.
“She’s trying to get back in the game flow,” Sinn said. “If she hits one of those shots, that’s a different story.”
After hosting Westville on Thursday, PBL will host Oakwood on Monday before playing at Calvary Christian Academy in Normal on Tuesday. The Panthers will host Georgetown-Ridge Farm the following Thursday before playing at Tri-Valley on Dec. 15.
“Now we move on to Westville, and we’ll see what we can do with them,” Sinn said. “Our girls are making each other better. Now we’ve got a stretch where I think we can go on a mini run of games where we can find some success and use that to our advantage. Hopefully, we can get in a rhythm offensively and defensively where we can pull out some wins and get the program moving forward.”
BHRA 36, PBL 31
BHRA 10 16 9 1 – 36
PBL 6 10 8 7 – 31
BHRA
Giana Brown 2-0-5, Gentry Elson 5-1-11, Shelby Jameson 0-0-0, Alivia Reifsteck 2-0-6, Reece Larsen 1-0-3, Ella Acton 0-6-6, Sophia Stines 2-1-5. Totals 12-8-36.
PBL (1-4)
Audrey McCoy 1-3-5, Olivia Rehg 1-0-3, Emmy Bagwell 0-0-0, Kylie Rust 6-1-13, Hallee Johnson 1-4-6, Anna Birge 0-0-0, Taylor Cole 2-0-4, Tessa Boehme 0-0-0. Totals 11-8-31.
3-pointers – BHRA 4 (Reifsteck 2, Brown, Larsen). PBL (Rehg).