Down to the last second

At a point during the second half it seemed that Hartley-Melvin-Sanborn was taking control of its Class 2A girls' regional quarterfinal game with Manson Northwest Webster. But the Hawks would only score two points the rest of the way and the Cougars did just enough to emerge with a 46-44 win on Feb. 13 in Hartley.

The closeness of the final score confirmed Hawk coach Ashley Tessum's feeling that the game would be a battle.

"Going into the game, I knew it was going to be a hard-fought game. We were pretty evenly matched teams," she noted. "I even told the team at halftime to keep battling; the...