There won’t be another fairy tale story with the Fairfield girls basketball team. Entering the IHSAA state tournament Friday night, Fairfield endured Wawasee’s best shot in a 40-34 win, only to fall two points short to NorthWood in Saturday night’s championship game, 34-32, to see its season come to a close.
In the sectional final, Fairfield trailed by as much as nine points in the second half, 24-15, before mounting a huge rally to take a 30-28 lead in the fourth quarter after Eva Herbert hit a three, Natalie Whitaker sankt a runner and Madison Jones laid in a bunny during the 15-4 run.
Megan Yoder would hit two free throws for NorthWood with 5.4 seconds left to lift NorthWood to a 34-30 advantage, and despite a Fairfield bucket on the other end, time ran out as NorthWood stunned the defending state champs for its 26th sectional crown.
Jones and Herbert both finished with 10 points for the Lady Falcons, which conclude its season 22-4 overall.
To get to Saturday, Fairfield had to fight off Wawasee in the semi-final. Jones was a problem for the Lady Warriors, hitting double digits in points in the first half before settling on 15 points for the night, but also had three steals, two rebounds and a block. Kaylee Dillon added 10 points, going 6-8 from the free throw line including a couple big makes late in the fourth quarter. Eva Herbert added six points and six rebounds to help knock out Wawasee.
Fairfield wrestling had six athletes working at Saturday’s Goshen Regional, and just one made it through the ticket round to semi-state.
Matthew Senn took care of NECC foe Jordan Klempp of Prairie Heights in round one, 4-2, to secure advancement, but then took out West Noble’s Taiden Chambers in the semis, 7-5, to reach the 138-pound final. There, Senn ran a little offense, but couldn’t shake Elkhart’s Cameron Dews in a 9-4 decision to leave Senn as regional runner-up and a two-seed for this weekend’s Fort Wayne Semi-state at the Memorial Coliseum. This is the third semi-state appearance in as many years for Senn, who is 28-8 in his junior season.
All five of the other Falcons lost their first matchup at Goshen.
Bradyn Williams, a late-week call-back at 150 pounds, lost by tech-fall to Brock Hagewood of Prairie Heights. As fate would have it, Williams is now a potential call-back this week for semi-state given Hagewood won the 150-pound bracket.
Dirk Rumfelt lost by fall to East Noble’s Ben Barker at 157 pounds, Aldahir Ortiz-Sanchez lost, 9-1, to East Noble’s Dallas Plattner, Ryan Noel ended up on the short end of a tough 6-5 loss to DeKalb’s Graham Blythe at 175 pounds, and Breckan Maran saw his fantastic season end after a 2-0 loss the East Noble’s Connor Reins at 190 pounds.
Fairfield boys basketball remained in a three-way tie atop the Northeast Corner Conference standings after its 49-32 win at Garrett Thursday night.
The Falcons sit at 6-1 overall, tied with Central Noble and Lakeland each with three NECC games to go. Fairfield finishes up with NECC road games at Fremont and Churubusco before hosting Central Noble in the final game of the regular season.
Against the Railroaders, Mitchell Miller scored nine of his game-high 12 points in the first half as Fairfield built a 27-15 advantage at the break. The Falcons also used a trio of threes from Brant Garber and nine points inside from Tyson Frey to get the win.
It was all Fairfield in the JV game, 58-29. All eight Falcons that played scored at least one basket, led by Cole Knight’s 14 points, along with 12 points from Drew Beachy and 10 points from Matthew Holsopple.