RIPON – Reina Sausedo scored eight of her team-high 13 points in the first half before the tournament-host Indians went cold in the second half and lost the championship game of the Ripon Winter Classic 43-38 to Bret Harte of Angels Camp.

“We played pretty evenly in the first half,” Ripon coach Rick Inderbitzin said. “We were up by eight points at halftime and came out in the second half and turned the ball over 17 times, as opposed to just three in the first half.

“And we were only 5 of 20 from the free-throw line. We didn’t play good defense in the second half – we came out kind of sluggish – and we are much better than that, so we are going to go back to the drawing board and get back to fundamentals again.”

Despite being outscored 12-5 in the third quarter, the Indians (5-2) led 31-30 before the Bullfrogs (5-5) nearly doubled them in the fourth period, 13-7.

Savannah Clark had seven rebounds for Ripon followed by Sausedo (three assists) and Felicia Ceja (two assists) with six rebounds apiece and Mia Van Lewen and Janessa Inderbitzen with five rebounds each.

Bret Harte’s Cali Anderson led all scorers with 16 points. 

Ripon Christian 51,

Millennium-Tracy 36

RIPON – The host Knights relied on their big girls for the non-league win on Saturday.

“We worked a lot on our post play all week,” Ripon Christian coach Ed Mulder said. “And our post players had a good game.

“We were in control most of the game. They made a little run in the second quarter to cut our lead from 15 points to 10.”

Elizabeth Weststeyn and Renae Heida had double-doubles for the Knights (3-6) with Weststeyn getting 18 points and 11 rebounds and Heida 12 points and 17 rebounds. Morgan Van Elderen added six points and seven assists and Mollu Hieksema had nine points.

Drew Jiminez led Millennium (5-5) with 16 points.