Playing its first third-place game in the Bowling Green Tournament since 2016, North Callaway girls basketball couldn't do what it did that year -- beat Winfield.
In a down-to-the-wire game, No. 2 seed Winfield won on the final possession, beating No. 5 seed North Callaway 43-42 Friday evening at Bowling Green High School.
The Ladybirds made eight 3s and played defensively sound basketball, but a slow start with no made shots from the field in the first quarter ended up haunting the Ladybirds.
While North Callaway started slow, the Ladybirds were up by two points at the start of the fourth quarter. Natalie Shryock extended North Callaway's lead to five when she scored the last of her team-high four 3s with a transition make from beyond the arc.
That was the second-largest lead the Ladybirds had, and it was also the final 3 for the team.
The Warriors narrowed the deficit to three points, when Kailey Gillespie made two attempts from the charity stripe. But the Ladybirds went up by four points on their next possession.
To do that, North Callaway's Jalyn Leible hit both her attempts from the free-throw line. Those were the Ladybirds' final made free throws of the contest. Unlike their game against Elsberry Wednesday, North Callaway had a good night at the line, going 10-for-13.
After Winfield narrowed the deficit to three points, Shryock extended the Ladybirds' lead to six. Going up for a layup, the Warriors fouled her as the ball hit the rim once and fell into the basket; Shryock made the and-1 attempt, making it 40-34 North Callaway.
It was the last of Shryock's game-high 15 points for the Ladybirds, as Winfield contained North Callaway's main scoring threat in the final four minutes of the contest.
The Ladybirds put up their final two points of the game when Riley Blevins made a layup, which gave North Callaway a 42-36 lead.
Unfortunately for the Ladybirds, Winfield defended well, made a shot from the field and converted 5-of-6 free throws after Blevins' layup. North Callaway had four drives with no points and two missed shots in that period.
Winfield all but secured third place when Gillespie hit her first of two free throws with 1.8 seconds left. Gillespie missed her second attempt, and the Ladybirds' Abrielle Burgher rebounded, but North Callaway didn't have enough time to score.
Before the nerve-wracking ending, each team controlled the game for extended lengths.
Early on, Winfield was that team. The Warriors outscored the Ladybirds 7-3 in a defensive first quarter -- Cailey Creech scored two putbacks, and Lily Boschert had a three-point play for Winfield.
"Early, it was more of a feeling out the teams," North Callaway coach Tim Turlington said. "Neither team got into their stuff very well. I know we didn't, but that's just kind of the way it goes there and sometimes early. I think we settled in as the quarter went on. Second quarter got going, and I think we played a little better. Defended a little better. And then we kind of built on that throughout the third quarter, most of the fourth quarter."
Unlike the first quarter, there was a lot of offense in the second quarter. The teams combined to make seven 3s and score 29 points.
For North Callaway, Shryock hit two 3s, while Blevins and Burgher each made a shot from deep.
"We were driving and kicking, and we're drive, pull and kick -- that's there," Turlington said. "They knock down shots that were there. They knock down the shots that we're supposed to shoot. So it was good; we're in rhythm, shooting in rhythm. That period of time when we ran our offense fast was a nice flow, rhythm. Rhythm is good."
Meanwhile, Kade Berry made two and Boschert a 3 for Winfield in the second quarter.
Each quarter may have played differently, but one consistency for the Ladybirds was Lakyn Hartley at the line. She made 4-of-6 attempts, with all her free throws coming in the first half.
On the defensive end, Ellie Bedsworth applied pressure on the Warriors throughout, especially early. Bedsworth pulled down eight boards and had one of her better defensive games this season.
"Ellie did a really good job, solid job setting hard screens," Turlington said. "Defending well defended in the interior. I thought she played really well."
Bedsworth also started the scoring for North Callaway in the second half, hitting a layup that cut the Ladybirds' deficit to one, 21-20.
North Callaway kept it up in the third quarter; the Ladybirds outscored the Warriors 15-11.
During the third, Ladybirds knocked down three 3s -- each from a different player -- and Burgher guided the team with seven points (finished with 12), including a 3-pointer.
"We're comfortable, forced them into bad shots (and) rebounded," Turlington said. "But we let them get away, knock down a couple of shots there. Put them on the line one time. That stuff you can't do if you're trying to build and hold a lead. So we kind of let that go."
The tremendous third quarter led to a faulty fourth quarter in which the Ladybirds couldn't get their offense going as they did in the second and third.
No matter the result, North Callaway's fourth-place finish at the Bowling Green Tournament was the best for a Callaway County girls basketball team at a tournament this season. However, Turlington and North Callaway would've rather had the win.
"When you have a chance to win it like that, it doesn't really matter if you think you've played well and all that stuff," Turlington said. "We lost the game; that's pretty much the bottom line. You can have moral victories, and all that stuff sounds good. But it's like eating plastic cookies -- it ain't the same thing.
"I'm forever gonna be proud of these girls. They work hard. They're there every day. I love what I'm doing. I love being with these girls. This has been a great kind of time in my career. I've been coaching for 32 years and never thought I'd coach girls, but I love it. I love the girls and the things they do."
North Callaway (12-10, 3-3) has a chance to get back in the win column, when they take on Eastern Missouri Conference opponent Elsberry (15-4, 3-0) at 6 p.m. Friday in Elsberry. The Ladybirds will seek revenge after the Indians beat them 48-39 Wednesday in the championship bracket semifinals of the Bowling Green Tournament.
"We're gonna have to play with a fair amount of intensity the entire game," Turlington said. "We can't get in foul trouble, can't turn the ball over probably more than 12 times. We're gonna have to guard really, really well, which we're capable of doing. So we're gonna have to play a pretty mistake-free game, and offensively we're gonna have to get some stuff done."