Winfield-Mt. Union pushes Notre Dame, falls by 11

BURLINGTON - Winfield-Mt. Union came to play on Tuesday night in their Class 1A District 8 quarterfinal against second-seeded Notre Dame, but the Wolves didn't have quite enough gas to upset the Nikes. Notre Dame came back in the second half to put the Wolves away 57-46.

After trailing 15-13 after one quarter, WMU came back in the second quarter to take a 27-26 lead into halftime.

'That was one of our points of emphasis was try to work the ball inside and see if we could get their big guy in a little foul trouble,” WMU head coach Klay Edwards said. 'We've got a little bit of size advantage down there with our three bigs. It worked well in the first half for us.”

Notre Dame ramped it up in the second half. The Nikes held the Wolves to a game-low nine points in the third to take a 39-36 lead into halftime, and then scored a game-high 17 in the fourth to put it away.

'They put a little more ball pressure on us up top. I told the kids if you have turnovers at midcourt to give them easy runouts for twos, that makes it tough,” Coach Edwards said. 'We could have taken care of the ball a little bit better and that fourth quarter it might have come down to the last second.”

The Wolves' freshman duo of Abram Edwards and Cam Buffington led the way once again. Edwards finished the game with 20 points, 12 rebounds, four assists and two blocks. Buffington finished with 12 points, 14 boards and three blocked shots.

Brace Wade scored seven points in the loss. Konner Wae scored three points. Jacob Kongable and Brady Loyd scored two points apiece.

WMU ended its season at 9-10.

'We return quite a bit, and we'll keep working through the summer,” Coach Edwards said. 'We play a lot of ball. I'm hoping we just keep building and building year after year.”

Notre Dame (14-6) will host New London (17-4) in the district semifinals, with the winner playing either Springville or Danville in the district championship.