GUERNSEY – It was a hard week for the Lady Vikings, falling to Southeast 9-36, Rock River 19-58, and Hanna-Elk Mountain, 35-46, but there is no lack of grit in the girls, and they intend to use it heading into Regionals.

Last week’s games began with a battle with the number-one ranked Southeast Lady Cyclones in the first quarter, where Layla Noggle and Lashea Dimas forced a Southeast turnover, but Lady Cyclones still netted 13 points in the first quarter. Quarter two saw Liberty Whitebird steal the ball twice and net one free throw; Rylee Thompson stole the ball from Lady Cyclone offense and nabbed two points for the board, ending the score 19-3, Southeast. Quarter three was much quieter with Southeast offense dominating the court and adding 12 points to the board. The Guernsey-Sunrise girls fought hard in the fourth quarter, and forced Southeast to keep active, resulting in some fouls against Thompson that allowed her to gain four points from the freethrow line. Dimas and Whitebird both took turns sneaking the ball away from the Lady Cyclone offense, but in the end, the Lady Vikings lost the battle, with the final score ending with a disappointing 9-36, Southeast.

Thursday, the Guernsey-Sunrise girls faced number-two conference team, the Rock River Lady Longhorns. The first quarter saw a small lead by the Lady Longhorns of 9-3, which widened by the second quarter to 25-5, Rock River. The girls hustled, but ended the third quarter, 46-11, Lady Longhorns. The fourth quarter saw defense step up to keep the Lady Longhorns from adding too many more points, and netting another eight points for the home team. The final buzzer sounded with a score of 58-19, Rock River.

Scoring was led by Whitebird with six points, followed by Jacelyn Schiele with four, and Noggle, Dimas and Thompson each with three.

That hard-fought game gave the Lady Vikings a jump start the following day in another conference match-up, this time against Hanna-Elk Mountain. The first quarter, saw teamwork as the Lady Vikings got a jump on offense with 10 points on the board, and defense kept the Lady Miners to four points. Things got heated in the second quarter while the battle on the court saw the Lady Vikings put up seven points, and the Lady Miners added eighteen, for a 17-21, Hanna-Elk Mountain half-time score. The Lady Vikings kept up the pace in the third quarter, which ended 37-23, Hanna-Elk Mountain; and a hard press in the fourth quarter helped the Lady Vikings gain ground, but the final score in the fourth was 46-35, Hanna-Elk Mountain.

Thompson led the team in scoring with 15 points; Whitebird added 13 points, including three trés; Nyquist, Atwood and Noggle added two each.

The Guernsey-Sunrise girls basketball team will be the number four seed in the Southeast Conference entering Regionals this weekend, playing Upton, the Northeast Conference’s number-one ranked team, at 1:30 p.m. Thursday afternoon.

“It’s been a long season since we started on Thanksgiving week but regionals is that weekend where seasons come to an end for some and goals are realized for others,” Coach Curtis Cook said as the team looks forward to regional games, “We are excited to have the chance to extend our season, but we also realize we have to earn it.”