By William / www.mcpherson-county-ks.com

LITTLE RIVER – The Little River boys opened 2022 Class 1A Division I sub-state play as the #3 seed and played on Thursday where they recorded a commanding 30-point, 64-34, win over Fairfield.

With the win the Redskins moves to 14-6 for the season and will now play #2 seed Goessel next Thursday, March 3. Goessel advanced with a 72-43 win over Burrton on Thursday and will come into the game with a 14-5 record.

The home fans were sweating in the first quarter as Little River finished the first eight minutes of play trailing Fairfield by one, 9-8 before the offense heated up and the Redskins poured 22 points into the scorebook in the second quarter while their defense held Fairfield to just seven, giving Little River a solid 14-point, 30-16 lead going into the halftime break.

Little River kept the offense fired up in the third quarter where they advanced their lead to 22 points at 43-21 before pushing out to the final 30-point victory.

The Redskins shot a solid 44% from the field and made an amazing 53% of their attempts from beyond the three-point line where they canned 10 three-pointers.

While Little River did commit 14 turnovers, they also made 15 steals on defense while grabbing 33 rebounds and dishing out 18 assists on 24 made shots from the field.

Both Braxton Lafferty and Logan Renken had huge nights offensively with Lafferty leading all scorers with 24 points while Renken hit for 20. The two also combined for nine three-pointers with six coming from Renken, and Lafferty led the team in rebounds with eight and tied for the team lead in steals with five along with Dalton Mantz. Mantz directed much of the offense as he found open Redskins enough to record 10 assists.

SCORING:     1          2          3          4          FINAL

Fairfield         9          7          5          13       34

REDSKINS     8          22       13       21       64

Fairfield Team Stats: Not Available.

LITTLE RIVER REDSKINS TEAM STATS: FG 24/55; 3-PTR 10/19; FT 6/10; AST 18; REBS 33; TO 14; STLS 15; BLK 1; PF 14.

LITTLE RIVER REDSKIN INDIVIDUAL STAT LEADERS: Scoring (64 total points): Braxton Lafferty – 24; Logan Renken – 20; Rylan Konen – 9; Allen Burrola – 4; Dalton Mantz – 3; Treyton Olander – 2; Kyle Bruce – 2. 3-Pointers Made (10): Renken – 6; Lafferty – 3; Konen – 1. Assists: Mantz – 10; Lafferty – 3; Renken – 2. Rebounds: Lafferty – 8; Burrola – 6; Konen, Bruce – 5; Mantz – 4. Steals: Lafferty, Mantz – 5; Burrola – 2. Blocked Shots: Konen – 1.