The St. Mary Cardinals will challenge the Harding County Ranchers at 6:00 p.m. on Thursday. Both teams are coming into the game red-hot, with St. Mary sitting on three straight wins and Harding County on 21.
St. Mary is on a roll after a high-stakes playoff matchup on Thursday. They snuck past Northwestern Area with a 34-29 victory. The 34-point effort marked the Cardinals' lowest-scoring matchup of the season, but in the end it didn't matter.
Meanwhile, Harding County blew past DeSmet, posting a 65-32 win. The Ranchers have made a habit of sweeping their opponents off the court, having now won 14 contests by 21 points or more this season.
St. Mary better focus on containing Bailey Rae Verhulst and Brayden Padden as the pair were huge in Harding County's win. Rae Verhulst shot 62% from the field en route to 22 points along with six steals and five rebounds, while Padden dropped a double-double with 19 points and 11 boards. With that strong performance, Padden is now averaging an impressive 2 steals per game. Another player making a difference was Macey Wendt, who posted six points in addition to eight boards and three steals.
Harding County's victory bumped their record up to 21-0. As for St. Mary, their win bumped their record up to 17-6.
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