Delta girls making strides, dismantling Cape Central in FSCB quarterfinal rout

Delta's Grace Ancell (left) attempts to block a shot from Cape Central's Jamie Dawson-Ides (right) during a Monday, December 16, 2024 First State Community Bank Holiday Classic game between the Delta Bobcats and the Cape Central Tigers at the Show Me Center in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Delta defeated Cape Central, 69-45.

Cole Lee ~ clee@semoball.com

Led by an explosive offense as some high-pressure defense, Delta girls basketball had no issue dispatching Cape Central in front of the Show Me Center crowd on Monday night, winning 69-45 to advance to the First State Community Bank Holiday Classic semifinals.

Cracking open a tie game four minutes in, the Ladycats opened up a 10-point lead going into the second quarter and led by 20-plus the rest of the way, seeing flashes of life from the Tigers but never enough to close the gap.

With Jade Berry commandeering a high-production, high-intensity offense, No. 3 Delta never scored less than 18 points in a quarter until the fourth on Monday and cruised to a sizeable win against No. 6 Cape Central.

“I like how hard we played,” Ladycats coach David Heeb said. “We’re a work-in-progress right now, but the girls are trying really hard.

“If we can just get a little better every day by the end of the year, we’ve got a chance to meet those same goals that we've always had.”

Like the other top three teams in the tournament, Delta relied heavily on an extensive pressing effort to get them to this team, which has resulted in many wins both this year and in the years prior.

But in the new 16-team field, there’s a lot of extra running involved with a relatively short time frame, bringing to light conditioning concerns as the later rounds of the tournament come around.

However, Heeb insists his girls are built for the long haul as they enter a critical semifinal fixture against St. Vincent on Wednesday in a rematch on the same floor at the same stage.

“I'm just glad these kids all get this experience,” Heeb said. “But the college-size floor four days in a week is tough on your legs, especially for a team like us that plays a full-court game.

“Our kids have to expend a lot of energy up here, but so does the other team playing against us.”

Delta moves forward to 5-1 for the year, rebounding from a tight loss to Chaffee last Thursday with a high-motor victory against a Cape Central team on the rise in front of the Show Me Center crowd.

Delta’s Jade Berry had an All-Tournament caliber performance with 25 points with three made triples, while junior post Grace Ancell put in 19 points to combine for 44 points between the two. Lillian Boitnott finished as the only other Ladycat in double figures with 13.

Cape Central drops to 3-4 for the season, ending a two-game winning streak and dropping the Tigers into the fifth-place bracket to take on Saxony Lutheran.

Jamie Dawson-Ide led Cape Central with 22 points in the loss, while Abigail Davenport’s 8 points placed second with two made 3-pointers.

Delta moves into an 8:30 p.m. Wednesday game at the Show Me Center against the all-too-familiar St. Vincent Indians, although both squads are each wildly different from the year before.

Heeb, good friends with Indians assistant Matt Rubel, laughed when talking about the semifinal matchup, joking about St. Vincent’s recent win against Meridian:

“I just told him that we’re gonna try to hold them under 100.”

Headed by two very vocal coaches, the first quarter was loud, long and ended in a big lead for Delta, up 18-8 after Cape Central held it to just 2 points in the first four minutes.

Delta continued to apply some fierce pressure, and even as the Tigers began to find their offensive footing, led by an Abigail Davenport 3-pointer, Jade Berry and her Ladycats never relented, building a 37-18 halftime lead.

Going into the third, the Delta offense only continued to ramp up, with Berry draining a corner 3-pointer to lead into a Cape Central timeout with three minutes left, the lead increasing to 29.

That timeout gave the Tigers a little life, finishing on a 6-4 run to cut the lead to 57-30 entering the final eight minutes of play.

The fourth quarter was undoubtedly the most exciting for Cape Central of the night, putting up 15 points but still falling far short as Delta punched its semifinal ticket with a 69-45 victory.