Parker Eshelman photo

Hickman players celebrate near the end of a 66-50 victory over Nixa in yesterday’s Class 5 quarter-final in Sedalia.

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The second-ranked Hickman girls basketball team wasted little time asserting itself during yesterday’s Class 5 quarterfinal against Nixa to take another step toward its goal of winning the program’s first state championship.

The Kewpies made their first five shots and forced nine first-quarter turnovers to build a 15-point lead en route to a 66-50 victory at State Fair Community College.

To say it was over before it started wouldn’t be exactly correct, because Nixa’s scrappy squad battled to the end. But, to listen to Hickman senior Lauren Nolke, it wouldn’t be far from the truth, either.

According to Nolke, some sizzling shooting by the Kewpies (28-1) during pregame warm-ups apparently carried over into the game.

"During warm-ups, Yvonne" Anderson "and I were doing the 3-on-2 drill, and she said, ‘Dang, I don’t think we’ve missed a shot yet,’ " Nolke said. "Then we were shooting free throws before the game, and we were both making everything.

"I was like, ‘It’s going to be a good night!’ "

Anderson scored Hickman’s first four points on the way to a game-high 24. Nolke made her first three 3-point attempts in the first quarter and finished with 22 points.

"Everything was falling, and we all came out and did what we practiced," Anderson said.

Anderson opened the game with a driving layup and added a baseline jumper after Nixa’s first turnover to give the Kewpies a 4-0 lead 40 seconds into the game. After Nixa’s second turnover six seconds later, Eagles Coach Randy Towe called a timeout to try to settle a young team that starts two freshmen and a sophomore.

"That was the game plan," Hickman Coach Tonya Mirts said. "We wanted to get in the run-and-jump right away. We wanted them to see the pressure immediately.

"We’ve done that to a lot of teams. … We said, ‘We’re going to have to make those young kids face this press.’ "

Predictably, Nixa (22-9) did not handle it well.

"We just did what we do every game, but we figured maybe with the youth of their team it probably would affect them a little more, and it did," Anderson said.

After Anderson’s early scoring outburst, Chasity Prince added a jumper, Nolke a 3-pointer and Anderson a layup off a pass from Prince to make the score 11-2.

Nolke sandwiched two 3-pointers around a Shana White basket to give Hickman a 19-7 lead. When Nixa cut the margin below double-digits with a three-point play by freshman Bethanie Funderburk, the Kewpies finished the quarter on a 6-0 run. Leading 25-10 heading to the second quarter, Hickman never allowed the margin to slip below 13 points the rest of the game.

"Coach Mirts came into this one telling us they were young and they never die down, so we made sure that we kept our focus," Nolke said. "They did have a lot of heart, and it was tough the whole game."

Although Nixa made Hickman work all 32 minutes for the victory, the remaining three quarters lacked much suspense. In the second quarter, Nolke added a pull-up jumper, her fourth 3-pointer and tossed in a missed layup by Taylor Ford on a break to give the Kewpies a 36-15 lead. At that point, Nolke’s 18 points led the Eagles.

"She spotted up, and we found her," Mirts said of Nolke, a Missouri Western recruit. "She was going to take care of business early, and I thought Yvonne finished the business."

With Hickman holding a 38-21 halftime lead, Anderson scored 14 of her points in the second half to help the Kewpies build an advantage as big as 23 points.

Funderburk and Nixa senior Ashlee Luko wouldn’t let the Kewpies get too far away, though. Funderburk led the Eagles with 14 points. Luko and sophomore Abby Bracker both scored 11.

"Give credit to them, they’re a never-say-die team," Mirts said. "This one was a worker. It might not have looked like it, but it felt like it. We really had to be explosive and on our mark early, and I think that really made a difference."

Advancing to the Show-Me Showdown for the fourth time and making their first appearance since finishing second in 2004, the Kewpies will face Liberty (25-4) in a 9:30 p.m. semifinal Friday at Mizzou Arena. Liberty beat Hickman Mills 64-57 in yesterday’s quarterfinal.

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