Girls Basketball: Pine Island knocks off second-ranked Goodhue

Pine Island took sole possession of first place in the Hiawatha Valley League Blue Division Tuesday with a 48-42 road victory against Goodhue.

The second-ranked (1A) Wildcats shot just 35 percent for the game and had difficulty with the Panthers’ height, Goodhue head coach Josh Wieme said.

“Pine Island was just very difficult for us to score against,” he said. “Pine Island has a lot of size, they had three girls over 6-foot in the starting lineup that are on the floor the whole time. That caused a lot of matchup problems for us. Overall, I thought we played pretty well. … It didn’t kill us but it did play a role in our shooting.”

Cede Finstuen finished with a game-high 20 points for the Panthers (11-3, 4-0 HVL Blue) and Nicole Fokken contributed 14 points.

Mikayla Miller and Mikayla Tipcke each scored 14 points to lead the Wildcats (13-2, 4-1 HVL Blue). Goodhue shot only 5 of 20 from the 3-point line.

Pine Island led 27-17 at halftime.

The Wildcats travel to face Kenyon-Wanamingo Thursday.

Tags: girls basketball, sports, prep, goodhue