Emma Buee/MDN LeeLee Bell, Minot High junior, goes to shoot the ball playing against Bismarck St. Mary’s Tuesday, January 27.

The Minot High girls basketball team hosted the Bismarck St. Mary’s Saints for a night of basketball. The first time the Majettes and the Saints faced off was at St. Mary’s High School with Minot High winning 63-54. The Majettes fought hard and took the 67-55 win over the Saints.

Minot High showed how much a team can improve over a season. With the state tournament soon approaching, all the basketball teams in North Dakota hope to continue making these improvements.

The first half was a battle with the Saints quickly taking a short lead. The Saints Natalie Benning brought in 18 points, including a 3-pointer and four points from the foul line. Mya Jones followed with eight more points for St. Mary’s.

Minot High retaliated with six points from Sydney Aberle and eight more from LeeLee Bell. Everettle Deschamp added four more points to the Majettes score, followed by teammate Kinley Bartsch with points for Minot High. Bell brought in eight more points.

St Mary’s Mataya Messer brought in four points to give the Saints a 30-29 lead going into halftime.

Bell scored 16 points in the first half of the game and earned herself 2000 varsity career points. Breaking 2000 points is a rare achievement to earn in high school basketball.

“It was one of the biggest accomplishments, I think I’ve ever had,” said Bell, “I couldn’t have done it without this team.”

Only a junior, Bell still has one more year to continue to impress everyone with her talent in basketball.

Through the second half of the game the Majettes started to slowly build a lead over the Saints.

Journey Oukrop and Jones led the score for St. Mary’s in the second half of the game, both athletes brought in six points for their team.

Bell led the scoring for Minot High, with a very impressive 21 points for the Majettes. Bartsch trailed behind making seven additional points for Minot High in the second half of the game.

St. Mary’s couldn’t catch back up to Minot High the second half of the game and scored an additional 13 points. Benning and Messer both scored five points for the Saints. Rachel Schmuacher and Stella Gallik brought in the last six points for St. Marys.

With over 40 free throw attempts, the Majettes had the opportunity to earn plenty of well deserved points from the free throw line to assist their win over the Saints.

Bell has one more big goal for the season. “Getting to state first, then winning it.” said Bell. With the state tournament approaching Minot High is tweaking needed technique to attempt to win the eight more scheduled conference games before qualifying for the state tournament.

Minot High travels to play the Bismarck High Demons Friday, January 31. The Majettes travel again to Dickinson to take them on for the second time this season Friday, February 7.